Jack although he received some hard blows, by dodging under the bedclothes, escaped better than his help-mate intended he should; he soon rose, dressed himself, and went to his master’s, sauntering sullenly about the outhouses till daylight, when a servant informed him, after narrating Twm’s trick on his master, that he was to take Cadwgan’s ass home. Squire Graspacre, since the death of his wife, gave such free range to his licentious pleasures, as placed him, especially at his years, in a most unseemly light. His only son had been two years at Oxford, returning only occasionally during vacations; while his two daughters, on the death of their mother, were sent to a boarding school at Exeter. Thus in his own family he had no witnesses of his vices and follies. He soon found, however, that in Wales, his offences against religion and morality were not to be committed with impunity. The respect in which he was formerly held by the country people gradually declined, while those who had daughters became extremely shy, and sent their female inmates out of the way whenever he approached. Never deficient in penetration, he was not long in discovering this change in the bearings of his tenants and neighbours, which to a mind like his, proud, fond of domineering, and being looked up to as the superior—the grand central luminary of his sphere, round which all others moved as silent and respectful satellites—was a very hell. The minds of men, however, his knowledge of mankind told him, were not to be over-ruled, and with a wisdom rare as effective, he immediately resolved, as the only mode of re-establishing his credit and happiness, to retrace his steps—to which end he sent for his daughters home, at a time when his son was about to return from Oxford—and thus, by the presence of his children, place a restrictive guard upon his future conduct. With this change in his ideas, it will be no wonder that Twm Shôn Catti was again taken into favor, and replaced in his former situation. At length the merry bells of Tregaron announced the arrival of the heir, and the young ladies of Graspacre Hall, which mansion soon became a scene of festivity. The meeting of the squire with his daughters was ardently affectionate; but his son Marmaduke had nothing of cordiality in his nature. His figure was tall and spare, with loose joints and ill-knit bones, while his countenance indicated both phlegm and a fidgetty, nervous peevishness. A curious eye might also discover in it decisive marks of late hours and dissipated habits. Proud, rash, and self-sufficient, his dislike of Wales and Welshmen surpassed his father’s partiality for them. He condescended, however, to say, that until he could get a clever English servant, in the place of the last, who ran away from him, he must put up with one of the Welsh savages. Accordingly, our hero was appointed to be his temporary valet, and ordered to attend exclusively on the young squire.