Mr. Clive used to leave home every day shortly after noon, when he was supposed to betake himself to Gandish’s studio. But was the young gentleman always at the drawing-board copying from the antique when his father supposed him to be so devotedly engaged? I fear his place was sometimes vacant. His friend J. J. worked every day and all day. Many a time the steady little student remarked his patron’s absence, and no doubt gently remonstrated with him, but when Clive did come to his work he executed it with remarkable skill and rapidity; and Ridley was too fond of him to say a word at home regarding the shortcomings of the youthful scapegrace. Candid readers may sometimes have heard their friend Jones’s mother lament that her darling was working too hard at college: or Harry’s sisters express their anxiety lest his too rigorous attendance in chambers (after which he will persist in sitting up all night reading those dreary law books which cost such an immense sum of money) should undermine dear Henry’s health; and to such acute persons a word is sufficient to indicate young Mr. Clive Newcome’s proceedings. Meanwhile his father, who knew no more of the world than Harry’s simple sisters or Jones’s fond mother, never doubted that all Clive’s doings were right, and that his boy was the best of boys. “If that young man goes on as charmingly as he has begun,” Clive’s cousin, Barnes Newcome, said of his kinsman, “he will be a paragon. I saw him last night at Vauxhall in company with young Moss, whose father does bills and keeps the bric-a-brac shop in Wardour Street. Two or three other gentlemen, probably young old-clothes-men, who had concluded for the day the labours of the bag, joined Mr. Newcome and his friend, and they partook of rack-punch in an arbour. He is a delightful youth, cousin Clive, and I feel sure he is about to be an honour to our family.” CHAPTER XIX. The Colonel at Home