of something not apparent, roused the dormant sentiment more than he could have thought possible. The one thing that interested Heathcote Mountford to the bottom of his heart was his young brother, for whom he had a tender, semi-parental passion, preferring his concerns above everything else in the world. It was this, indeed, which had brought him to Mount with a proposal which he could not but feel that Mr. Mountford would grasp at. He had come to offer to his predecessor in the entail that they should join together and break it--a singular step for an heir in his position to take. But as yet he had said nothing about this chief object of his visit. When he formed the project it had not cost him much. What did he want with an estate and a big house to keep up, he had said to himself in the snugness of his bachelor’s chambers, so much more comfortable than Mount, or any other such big barrack of a place could ever be made? He had already a shabby old house to which he went now and then to shoot, and which--because Edward (not to speak of himself) had been born in it, and their mother had died in it, as well as many generations of Edwards and Heathcotes in the past--could not be done away with, however melancholy and dismal it might get to be. But Mount had no associations for him. Why should not St. John’s girls have it, as was just and natural? The Mountfords of Mount were not anything so very great that heaven and earth should be moved to keep them up. Besides, he would not be of much use in keeping them up; he never meant to marry (not because of Antonia, but probably because of ‘knocking about’ and forgetting that any one thing in the world was more important than any other), and Edward was delicate, and there was no telling what the boy might do;--far better to have a good sum of money, to set that wayward fellow above the reach of trouble, and leave it to St. John’s girls to provide for the race. No doubt they would do that fast enough. They would marry, and their children could take the name. Thus he had his plans all cut and dry before he reached Mount. But when he got there, either the reserve of Mr. Mountford’s manner, or some certain charm in the place which he had not anticipated, deferred the execution of it. He thought it over and arranged all the details during each day’s shooting, notwithstanding that the gamekeepers insisted all the time on discoursing with him upon the estate, and pointing out what should be done under a new reign which the present master did not care to have done; but in the evening he was too tired (he said to himself) to open so important a subject; and thus day after day went on. Perhaps the discourses even of the gamekeepers, and their eagerness to point out to him the evils that were to be amended at presumably the not very distant period when a new monarch should reign, and the welcome he received from the people he met, and the success he had at Meadowlands, and the