Master Philip, the subject of the foregoing conversation, was the only son and heir of Ainsley Fuller, Esq., of Waverdale Park, who owned nearly all the village of Nestleton, many a farm round, and half the town of Kesterton into the bargain. The squire, as he was called, was rich in worldly wealth, but poor in human sympathies and the more enduring treasures of the heart. In early life he had essayed to run a political career; but his first constituency turned their backs upon him, and on the second he turned his back, disgusted at the pressure brought to bear upon him by a predominant radicalism. Unfortunate in his wooing, his first and only true love was taken from him by death, and a lady to whom he was subsequently betrothed was stolen from him by a successful rival on the eve of the bridal day. After living to middle age, and developing a disposition half cynical and accepting a creed half sceptical, he had suddenly and unwisely married a youthful wife, whose tastes and habits of life were altogether foreign to his own. A brief span of unhappy married life was closed by the death of that lady, leaving the new-born babe to the sole guardianship of the seemingly cold and irascible father, whose whole affection, small in store apparently, was fixed on the infant squire--the Master Philip of this story. Those, however, who depreciated the measure of Squire Fuller’s love for his only son were much mistaken. His immobile features and piercing eyes, peering from beneath the bushy brows of silver grey, told nothing of the mighty love that lurked within. Nor did Philip himself, for a long time, at all discern, beneath his father’s cold exterior, how the old man really doted on his boy. That remained to a great extent a secret, until a strangely potent key was inserted among the hidden wards of the parental heart, and a rude wrench flung wide the flood-gates, and set free the imprisoned stream. CHAPTER IV. “AUD ADAM OLLIVER.” “Though old, he still retain’d His manly sense and energy of mind, Virtuous and wise he was, but not severe; He still remembered that he once was young; His easy presence checked no decent joy, Him even the dissolute admired; for he A graceful looseness, when he pleased, put on, And, laughing, could instruct.” _Armstrong._