I would go away somewhere--where, it mattered not; I would seek a path for myself; another time--a year hence, perhaps--I would come back and see Ruth again, if Fortune smiled on me. And with such thoughts as these, my sadness and dejection gave place to the springy and joyous conviction of a young heart--that I was free--absolutely FREE--the master of my own person--the arbiter of my own destiny! The wide world was all before me, and to leave care and trouble behind should be now my task and duty. How was this to be achieved? I was the possessor only of a shilling; but greater men than I have begun the world with less. As these ideas occurred to me, I perceived in the twilight a gentleman with two valets in livery, all well mounted, coming along the road with their nags at a trot. He wore a green sporting suit, with large gilt buttons, yellow buckskin breeches, a jockey cap, and carried a heavy hunting-whip. As the two valets were not riding behind, but were abreast with their master, and conversing with him in loud and noisy familiarity, I soon recognised my cousin Tony the Foxhunter, an interview with whom I would fain have avoided; but he knew me at once, and came brusquely up, checking his horse, with foam upon its bit, so close to me, that I was nearly knocked over. "Zounds, cousin Basil!" said he, insolently, and in the hearing of his valets, "you are in a fine scrape now!" "How, sir?" said I, sourly. "So you have levanted from old Wylie's--or been turned adrift--'tis all one, for making love to his niece--eh--is this true?" "I have no confidences to make to you, sir," said I, haughtily, for the idea that I had placed Ruth--she so innocent and pure--in a position so false, filled me with remorse and rage. "No confidences," stammered Tony; "eh--damme?" "None." "Oh, it is of no use denying it; we have just ridden from old Wylie's this morning. We don't blame you for making love to the girl--she is deuced pretty, and we all agreed it was just what we should have done ourselves." "_We_--who do you speak of?" "Why, Tom, Dick, and myself," he replied, pointing to his servants; "and no bad judges either of the points and paces of a woman or a horse." "Rein back from the footpath if you please, Mr. Gauntlet, and permit me to pass," I added, for he had me completely hemmed against a hedge. "Well, but what are you going, to do _now_, for we can have no onhangers idling about Netherwood Hall?" he exclaimed, imperiously.