“_I_ do not, _ma mère_, because my taste does not lie in that direction. My vices--and I have plenty--are of another sort. I unsettle my mind with heterodox publications. I entertain opinions which are subversive of the principles of good government as believed in by your Ladyship's family. You know in what sort of faith I have been brought up. Moreover, I live in town among a slow, hard-working set, who have neither time nor inclination for going to race-courses; and, indeed, I am now getting a little practice at the bar myself. If I were a handsome young swell in a regiment of Light Dragoons, then, instead of publishing that amusing work upon the _Law of Entail_, which, with a totally inexcusable pang, I saw lying upon your library-table to-day _uncut_, I should without doubt be making a betting-book. Having no call towards that sort of employment, however, I am very severe upon it. I term it waste of time, loss of money, &c.; and in the case of your son, I have even been so foolish as to remonstrate with him on that very account--an interference which, I fear, has cost me his friendship.” “Has he lost money through this man Derrick, think you?” “Not yet, or they would not be upon such good terms. A turf friendship ceases at the first bad bet. The fact is, it was about his imtimacy with this drunken fellow that I ventured to speak; it increases the misunderstanding already unhappily existing between your sons; for you know what a dislike Sir Richard has shewn for this person, while for Walter himself I believe him to be a most dangerous acquaintance.” “Dangerous?” inquired my Lady hurriedly--“how mean you dangerous?” “He is bad company for any young man, and he has acquaintances who are worse. Walter is 'hail-fellow-well-met' with everybody, and may find himself one day so deeply involved with these folks, that extrication may not be easy. He has plenty of wits, and well knows how to take care of himself in a general way; but all his great advantages are useless to him among this particular class. His genial wit, his graceful ways, his tenderness of heart--nay, even his high spirits, all go for nothing with such vulgar good-for-naughts, whom, in my opinion, he will be lucky not to find downright cheats and scoundrels.” “Is this man Derrick, then,” inquired my Lady, gazing fixedly upon the dark swirling stream, “irredeemably base and vicious?” “No, not so,” answered the young man frankly; “he has the lees of good still left in him, without which, indeed, he would be less harmful. Walter was taken from the first with his openness and candour--which are so great that he seems quite lost to the sense of shame--and with his lavish generosity, which is probably the result of rapid fortunemaking. He made five thousand pounds or so, it seems, in a few weeks at gold-digging, and I should think he was in a fair way to spend it in almost as short a period.” “Perhaps he may have been spoilt by that mode of life,” observed Lady Lisgard pitifully.