We have represented Horatio Markham as a man of talent and general good judgment, but we have not described him as a paragon of all possible and impossible excellence. He was a steady, quiet, sober, clear-headed man, who understood his professional and his moral duties, who gave himself seriously to the business to which he was brought up, and who wished very naturally to rise in the world. In a very high degree he was early successful; but he was not vain of that success, nor did he think himself the greatest or the only genius in the world. In matters of intellect he was unpretending, and in matters of a moral nature pure and conscientious. As he had proceeded he became more ambitious; and by the distinguished patronage which he enjoyed, he hoped to take ultimately a higher rank in society than at the commencement of his career he had anticipated. He had hoped that his parents, either by his own exertions or by their circumstances, might soon retire from business; but when instead of this retirement he found that there was pecuniary embarrassment which he could not easily, if at all, remove, he was severely disappointed; and when in addition to this the illness of his father detained him from town and from Clara, he feared the worst that could happen. Nor could he imagine that in this complication of unfortunate and perplexing circumstances there was any good likely to arise either to himself or to any one else. But he was wrong; for the illness of the father was the means of deciding the destiny of the son’s life. CHAPTER IX. “To deal in wordy compliment Is much against the plainness of my nature.” ROWE. Considering the language with which the preceding chapter is closed, it would not be decorous to fly off in a tangent to discuss the movements of other characters in our narrative; though we may very well suppose that some of our readers would be glad to know how the Right Hon. the Earl of Trimmerstone bears his retirement, and how he looks in his reformed condition. Nothing more, however, does it suit us now to state on this head, than that orders had been given, and were rapidly proceeding in their execution, for the repair and reformation of Trimmerstone Hall, and that his lordship found some amusement in superintending these repairs.