“So you have come to town to look after me, Master Philip. But who would have thought of meeting you in this part of the world? What, have you any sly money transactions, or are you come to look after some rich citizen’s daughter. Or, perhaps, you have been at my hotel, and you were directed here to find me. But is your company all gone? Is it not rather rude to leave them? Well, but I hope you will not stay long in town; for there are sad doings at the Abbey when you are out. The other day, when you went to the archery nonsense at Hovenden, I actually found a couple of fellows smoking their filthy pipes in the great hall at the Abbey, and I had much ado to send them out of the house. Oliver told me they were drunk. They had the impudence to call themselves sheriffs’ officers. Now, I do not like this.” The old gentleman had talked himself almost out of breath, and it was well for the young gentleman that the old one did not like the sound of any one’s voice so well as that of his own. Philip was one of those conscientious people who endeavour as much as possible to avoid all unnecessary lies; and when he wished to deceive, he preferred the circuitous shuffling mode of equivocation to a plain downright honest lie. In some cases he found a difficulty in escaping by this contrivance; and this difficulty he would have found in the instance in question, had not old Mr. Martindale been too much taken up with other thoughts and other interests than those of Philip Martindale and Brigland Abbey. But in truth he had been so much delighted with his newly-discovered daughter, that he took no very lively interest in any thing else. At their first meeting there were, as we said, no very extraordinary raptures or dramatic exhibition; but as they grew better acquainted, the old gentleman was charmed with the mild good sense and amiable manners of Signora Rivolta, and was greatly pleased with the intelligence and meekness of his grand-daughter Clara. Even Colonel Rivolta, though he had commenced life in a mercantile line, and had spent his best days in the army, yet was not destitute of information and literary taste. But the Hon. Philip Martindale, though born a gentleman, educated at an English university, and destined for the legal profession, was, notwithstanding all these advantages, by no means attached to literature, or endowed with any great share of taste. The old gentleman therefore had not been much delighted with his society, inasmuch as his conversation was either grievously common-place, or concerning those sports in which Mr. John Martindale took no interest. Serious rivals therefore had started up to engross the notice of the opulent relative. This fact was known very quickly to those whom it concerned; viz. the gentlemen of the strictest honor and secrecy. Theirs, indeed, would be but a bad business, if they could not now and then get possession of early intelligence and important secrets.