had it not been for my private motive power, I should have been ashamed of my public one. As it was, my scholarly pride was secretly chafed at the thought that I was carrying into the affairs of state the greed of trade. Suddenly, most unexpectedly, this estate was bequeathed to me. You large proprietors will smile when I say that we had always regarded the Grays of Oakden Hall with venerating pride; they were the head of our branch of the clan. My father had seen this place in his boyhood; the remembrance of it dwelt on his mind as the unequivocal witness of his dignity as a gentleman born. He came from the same stock as the Grays of Oakden, who had lived on the land for more than three centuries, entitled to call themselves squires. The relationship was very distant, still it existed. But a dream that so great a place as Oakden Hall, with its 1000 acres, should ever pass to his son—no, my father thought it much more likely that his son might be prime minister! John Gray of Oakden had never taken the least notice of us, except that, when I won the Pitt scholarship, he sent me a fine turkey, labelled ‘From John Gray, Esq. of Oakden.’ This present I acknowledged, but John Gray never answered my letter. Just at that time, however, as appears by the date, he re-made his will, and placed me as remainder-man in case of the deaths, without issue, of two nearer relations, both nephews. These young men died unmarried—the one of rheumatic fever, a few months before old Gray’s decease; the other, two weeks after it; poor fellow, he was thrown from his horse and killed on the spot. So, unexpectedly, I came into this property. Soon afterwards I married. The possession of land is a great tranquilliser to a restless spirit, and a happy marriage is as sedative as potent. Poverty is a spur to action. Great wealth, on the other hand, not unnaturally tends to the desire of display, and in free countries often to the rivalry for political power. The golden mean is proverbially the condition most favourable to content, and content is the antidote to ambition. Mine was the golden mean! Other influences of pride and affection contributed to keep me still. Of pride; for was I not really a greater man here, upon my ancestral acres and my few yearly hundreds, than as a political aspirant, who must commence his career by being a political dependant? How rich I felt here! how poor I should be in London! How inevitably, in the daily expenses of a metropolitan life, and in the costs of elections (should I rise beyond being a mere nominee), I must become needy and involved! So much for the influence of pride. Now for the influence of affection; my dear wife had never been out of these rural shades among which she was born. She is of a nature singularly timid, sensitive, and retiring. The idea of that society to which a political career would have led me terrified her. I loved her the better for desiring no companionship but mine. In fine, my desires