"And as it usually happens in old families that the children who have been brought up by their parents in the same ideas in which the latter were brought up by their parents, and not only in the same ideas, but also in the same habits, morally, socially, and professionally, resemble their parents, both bodily and mentally, more than is the case under other circumstances, and this resemblance is at first looked upon as a curiosity, and then, after the fashion of mankind, as an advantage, so it has been with us. I know that this family pride is in the eyes of others laughable, if not wrong. I have no intention of justifying it; I have, as I told you at first, no other object than to give you an insight into the innermost life and habits of the family from which I descend, and thus to facilitate the explanation of certain peculiarities of character and of the rule by which I regulate and have regulated what I do or leave undone in all cases, as, for example, in the following: "One of my two sisters--there are three of us--married to a rich landed proprietor, had the misfortune to have been mistaken in her choice, and committed the fault of bearing her unhappiness unworthily, and even of making it an excuse for a passion which she conceived for a man whom she had met abroad, and who was wanting, not only in noble birth, but also in all those virtues and qualities which I require in every man whom I am to respect. Death brought about the separation to which my brother-in-law had refused his consent. His large property was to descend to my children. After long resistance and deep consideration, in order not to embitter the unhappy man's dying hours, I accepted the half for my children, under the same conditions which were imposed upon my sister for the possession of the other half, namely, that the inheritance should pass from her if she ever made a marriage contrary to the traditions of our family; I mean a marriage with a man not of noble birth. I may mention, by-the-way, that I myself had and have no resources but my pay, with the exception of what, to modern ideas, is a very small sum which I have saved out of that pay in the course of years. Even that small portion I no longer possess. My son has not inherited my economical habits; perhaps the spirit of the times, which is so unfavourable to the moderation which was recommended to us old people as the highest virtue is in fault. Perhaps I myself made a mistake when I allowed him to enter a regiment in which, as matters stand now, all the officers should be rich men; enough that my son has incurred debts which I have paid as long as it was in my power. For the reasons before mentioned, I can do this no longer, and I have unfortunately cause to suspect that my son's position is a very precarious one if he loses the revenues of the inheritance on which he entered a year and a half ago. There would result for him from a marriage contrary to the habits of his rank and the traditions of his