Ralph Newton had much to think of, and much that required thinking of at once. Did he mean to make an offer to Clary Underwood? Did he mean to take Polly Neefit and her L20,000? Did he mean to marry at all? Did he mean to go to the dogs? Had he ever in his life seen anybody half so beautiful as Mary Bonner? What was he to say to Mr. Moggs? How was he to manage about that L500 which Horsball would demand of him in September? In what terms could he speak to Neefit of the money due both for breeches and the loan, in the event of his declining Polly? And then, generally, how was he to carry on the war? He was thoroughly disgusted with himself as he thought of all the evil that he had done, and of the good which he had omitted to do. While he was yet at college Sir Thomas had been anxious that he should be called to the Bar, and had again and again begged of him to consent to this as a commencement of his life in London. But Ralph had replied,--and had at last replied with so much decision that Sir Thomas had abandoned the subject,--that as it was out of the question that he should ever make money at the Bar, the fact of his being called would be useless to him. He argued that he need not waste his life because he was not a lawyer. It was not his intention to waste his life. He had a sufficient property of his own at once, and must inherit a much larger property later in life. He would not be called to the Bar, nor would he go into the army, nor would he go abroad for any lengthened course of travelling. He was fond of hunting, but he would keep his hunting within measure. Surely an English private gentleman might live to some profit in his own country! He would go out in honours, and take a degree, and then make himself happy among his books. Such had been his own plan for himself at twenty-one. At twenty-two he had quarrelled with the tutor at his college, and taken his name off the books without any degree. About this, too, he had argued with Sir Thomas, expressing a strong opinion that a university degree was in England, of all pretences, the most vain and hollow. At twenty-three he began his career at the Moonbeam with two horses,--and from that day to this hunting had been the chief aim of his life. During the last winter he had hunted six days a week,--assuring Sir Thomas, however, that at the end of that season his wild oats would have been sown as regarded that amusement, and that henceforth he should confine himself to two days a week. Since that he had justified the four horses which still remained at the Moonbeam by the alleged fact that horses were drugs in April, but would be pearls of price in November. Sir Thomas could only expostulate, and when he did so, his late ward and present friend, though he was always courteous, would always argue. Then he fell, as was natural, into intimacies with such men as Cox and Fooks. There was no special harm either in Cox or Fooks; but no one knew better than did Ralph Newton himself that they