As for the gentry round, there was a very mixed feeling in their minds with regard to the defaulter and his occupation. They had nearly all of them cellars of excellent brandy and wine that had never paid duty, and were by no means desirous of seeing the illicit traffic too rigidly put down. They winked at it, if they did not actually encourage it; and it was well known that half of them would always buy smuggled goods and ask no question, in spite of all that the indignant officers could urge to the contrary. The country was soon in a state of pleasurable excitement with the news that the Reform Bill had successfully passed the Commons, and had only to go through the Upper House to become law. The ignorant people considered the triumph already assured, and began to wonder why something wonderful did not immediately happen to change the current of their lives and issue in a new prosperity and affluence. But others shook their heads, and said the Lords would be certain to throw it out, whilst some argued that they would not dare, when the mind of the country had been so emphatically declared. The Duke was very doubtful as to the result. “The Duke of Wellington will fight it tooth and nail,” he said to those who asked his opinion, “and I think he will carry the House with him. My kinsman, young Marchmont, tells me that if the Lords refuse to pass it, they will urge the King to make such a number of new Whig peers as shall suffice to carry it in the teeth of all opposition. His Majesty is very averse to such a step, though anxious for the passage of the bill. It remains to be seen what will happen. But I do not think the Iron Duke will give way.” All this talk sufficed to keep the country alive and excited through the early autumn months. Eustace wrote regularly, sometimes to the Duke, sometimes to Bride; and she wrote to him according to promise, telling him the news of the place, her own particular history, and the doings of Saul. Eustace himself wrote to Saul from time to time, and received answers from the wild young man always breathing a spirit of personal loyalty and devotion; but nothing which passed induced him for one moment to give up his wild life. His boat was always speeding between the shores of England and France. He was seldom at home, and when in the cottage on the beach, seldom to be spoken with by any of those who would gladly have tried to approach him for his own good. Bride once or twice encountered him, and spoke gently to him; but though he stood before her silently and with an outward aspect of respect, he would scarcely give her back a word, and only appeared to listen to her with any willingness when she told him of Eustace.