At this crisis, the sudden death of his mother placed him in possession of her own large fortune and family estate. Life once more opened before him; but no gentle affection called him back to the paternal neighborhood. On the contrary, he emigrated to Georgia, just then luminous with the career and the fame of General Oglethorpe; with the ambitious design of founding a Bergan lineage in the new world, which should equal, if not surpass, that of the old one. He bought a vast tract of land, and vigorously commenced the work of bringing it under cultivation; he distinguished himself both as soldier and citizen in the Spanish war and the colonial trials, and was knighted for his services; finally, he imported men and materials, and built Bergan Hall as nearly as was possible in the style of his early English home, and called it by the same name. The bricks, the tiles, the elaborate oak carvings, the door and window-frames, the furniture and decorations, the copies of ancestral portraits, were all brought from England, and put in their places by English artisans. Scarcely was the work finished ere he died, bequeathing to his descendants, not only a vast estate, a splendid home, and an illustrious name, but, by a still stronger law of heirship, certain marked traits of character hereditary in himself,--indomitable energy, dogged independence, strong family pride, and an occasional lunacy of rage, familiarly known as the "Black Bergan temper," to which the race had been subject from time immemorial. These characteristics were to be traced, more or less distinctly through all the portraits of his successors; but in none did they seem to be so perfectly reproduced as in his present representative. In truth, Major Bergan might be regarded as the original Sir Harry over again; his harsh features and stern expression being shown in the old, time-darkened picture with a degree of prophetical accuracy little short of actual portraiture. Other pictured faces there were, however, which time, still faithful to its work of bringing out the essential truth, had only touched into softer beauty. Such was the face of Eleanor, wife of Sir Harry; a woman of fair and noble presence, in the rich prime of her life, with a wise, strong, beautiful soul, shining out through her deep, soft eyes. Before this picture Bergan lingered long. Even in babyhood, his mother had resembled it strongly enough to make it seem most fitting that she should receive its name; and the likeness had so strengthened with years, that now, it might easily have passed for her portrait, painted from life.