Frederic was a liar of the common type, which indulges in absurd and useless exaggerations. When he bought a neck-tie at a cheap hosier's for half-a-crown he would say he got it at a more fashionable shop for seven-and-six, though the name of the maker was sewn inside it. When he borrowed money he would ask for three times as much as he wanted. When he walked three miles he always stretched them out to ten. His lying was for his own benefit first of all, and it was to help in deceiving himself that he extended it to other people. His income was always estimated at at least three times too high a figure, and his expenditure, which also he blew out to convince himself of the truth of his estimate, always exceeded it. Jessie had two hundred a year: he persuaded himself that she had five hundred, and forced many quarrels upon her because she came to him with bills for household expenses. . . . Time and again did Jessie find him out in his lying, but, as he always carried it into their intimate relation and multiplied the nothing that he gave her to the _n_th power, she was appeased; but imperceptibly she was contaminated, and in spite of her many anxious moments as to their solvency, contracted the habit of lying to her family as to her affairs and the state of Frederic's business. This was, in fact, unhealthy. Outside the management of the Bradby-Folyat estate there was very little work that could bring in any solid profit, though in his office there was an air of bustling activity due to the fairly constant stream of small county-court and police-court cases, which came to him as a tribute to his prowess as a liar. Being what is called a gentleman, he could lie from a coign of vantage, and a number of small shopkeepers and shady customers came to Lawyer Folyat, though, when there was any danger of a skilful cross-examination, they soon learned to avoid him. Still, there was enough business in the office to go to Frederic's head: he was one of those men who are perpetually intoxicated, though they never touch alcohol and may be, frequently are, ardent temperance reformers. Every case that came into his office became four or five in his mind, and he never doubted but that he was building up a large, solid, and flourishing business. He had all the air of a successful man, hoodwinked many innocent persons and very soon had two young men as articled clerks, whose premiums went to swell his banking account. He was what is called generous, gave for the pleasure of being thanked, and lavished presents on his wife, his mother, his mother-in-law, his sisters, and Jessie's sisters. He thought for a long time of paying his father back some of the money that had been disbursed for him, thought it over so long that at last he believed he had repaid it and patted himself on the back as a dutiful son. . . . When he had moments of doubt--and they were very awful when they came--he would go to his