“Then, sir,” said Woodward, “I take it, with every respect, that you must be a quack.” “Did you ever know a quack to work a cure without medicine?” replied the other; “I cure without medicine, and that is more than the quack is able to do with it; I consequently, cannot be a quack.” “Then, in the devil's name, what are you?” asked Woodward, who felt that his extraordinary fellow-traveller was amusing himself at his expense. “I reply to no interrogatory urged upon such authority,” said the stranger; “but let me advise you, young man, not to allow that mysterious and malignant power which you seem to possess to gratify itself by injury to your fellow-creatures. Let it be the principal purpose of your life to serve them by every means within your reach, otherwise you will neglect to your cost those great duties for which God created you. Farewell, my friend, and remember my words; for they are uttered in a spirit of kindness and good feeling.” They had now arrived at cross-roads; the stranger turned to the right, and Woodward proceeded, as directed, toward Rathfillan House, the residence of his father. The building was a tolerably large and comfortable one, without any pretence to architectural beauty. It had a plain porch before the hall-door, with a neat lawn, through which wound a pretty drive up to the house. On each side of the lawn was a semicircle of fine old trees, that gave an ancient appearance to the whole place. Now, one might imagine that Woodward would have felt his heart bound with affection and delight on his return to all that ought to have been dear to him after so long an absence. So far from that, however, he returned in disappointment and ill-temper, for he calculated that unless there had been some indefensible neglect, or unjustifiable offence offered to his uncle Hamilton by his family, that gentleman, who, he knew, had the character of being both affectionate and good-natured, would never have left his property to a stranger. The alienation of this property from himself was, indeed, the bitter reflection which rankled in his heart, and established in it a hatred against the Goodwins which he resolved by some means to wreak upon them in a spirit of the blackest vengeance. Independently of this, we feel it necessary to say here, that he was utterly devoid of domestic affection, and altogether insensible to the natural claims and feelings of consanguinity. His uncle abroad, for instance, had frequently urged him to pay a visit to his relatives, and, of course, to supply him liberally with the necessary funds for the journey. To every such suggestion, however, he gave a decided negative. “If they wish to see me,” he would reply, “let them come and see me: as for me, I have no wish to see them, and I shall not go.”