MR. CUTHBERT MANWARING had succeeded to the estate of Holmcastle under the provisions of the will of an old bachelor uncle, Algernon by name, who had seldom visited his estate, and who died, where he had lived the best, or worst part of his life, in a small street off St. James’s Square. This Algernon had been a friend of the Prince Regent, and although a very fine gentleman, as fine gentlemen were in those days, he was a very worthless person, and had much impoverished the family estate by his extravagance. Probably there were but few of the friends of the “First Gentleman in Europe,” so called, who, in consequence of the intimacy which subsisted between them, escaped serious injury “in mind, body, and estate,” and to this rule Algernon Manwaring was certainly no exception. The estate was left in the first instance to the elder brother, Cuthbert’s father, Captain Crackenrode Manwaring, and to his heirs male after him; and then, failing these, to the second brother, Edgar, a somewhat dissipated and dilapidated Queen’s Counsel; and then, in case of his demise, to his son or sons after him. It chanced, however, that both the younger brothers, Crackenrode and Edgar, died in their eldest brother’s lifetime, and so it fell out that, on the death of Algernon, the estate passed at once to his nephew, Cuthbert Piercey, the son of Captain Crackenrode Manwaring, who, brought up to no definite profession, had lately married the beautiful, but almost penniless daughter of the last Earl of Ingleborough. This lady bore to her husband three children--first, a boy named Lionel; and then, after an interval of five years, a daughter, Evelyn; and lastly, the following year, another boy, who was christened Wilfred. In giving birth to this her youngest child, the gentle Lady Honoria herself died. It would be too much to say that the Squire was much affected or disturbed by the death of his young wife. He was a cold, or rather a thin-blooded person, who had married, not for love, but solely and simply to secure a male heir for the Holmcastle property, and to transmit the name of Manwaring to succeeding generations in his own line. He looked upon his wife mainly as a means to that all-important end; and, that end being obtained, he was not the man to care much about the means.