There are some young men thus ushered into a world of trial and of temptation, for whom the code of honour--in so many respects the Christian code--would stand in stead of what are called higher principles, and would keep them at least tolerably straight in the path which they were fated to tread; but of such exceptional young men as these Frederick Norcott did not, unfortunately for himself and his friends, happen to be one. Cursed with the strongest passions, adoring as well as despising women, utterly selfish, and a gambler to the backbone, who can wonder that Frederick Norcott should very early in life have become bankrupt in fortune, friends, and reputation,--in all, in short, that should make existence valuable to its possessor? But for the wars, which were consecutively so instrumental in the “keeping going” of sundry of England’s impecunious sons and heroes, Fred Norcott would very soon have been laid on an extremely comfortless shelf. How he contrived to live, after his paternal inheritance had been reduced to actual nothingness, was pretty much a secret between the Jews, his creditors, and himself. As a soldier, however, he stood high. As fearless before the foe as he was audacious with the fair, Fred Norcott, as long as shots were flying, and human flesh and bones were required to stop them, kept his head above water tolerably well. But the day of reckoning came at last. Ships came back full instead of empty of soldiers from the East; the last rebel Pandy was scattered to the winds; the dead had buried their dead, and hungry creditors began to think of gathering up the fragments that remained. For a time--why does not appear, except for the reason that some men do possess more than others the gift of softening hearts--Colonel Norcott’s natural enemies seemed disposed to allow him that highly improvable item, time. Perhaps seeing that the Colonel came under the head of that large class, namely, “distinguished officers,” it would scarcely have _paid_, immediately after his retirement from the service, to be hard upon him. To have coarsely insisted upon payment--to have “taken steps” for the “settlement” of their long-standing accounts--might have occasioned the loss to those rapacious tradesmen of the custom of better men; so, as I said before, they waited for a while, with what patience they could muster, for the turning of the tide.