“Certainly, sir,” said Val, with a blithe assent which was trying to his grandfather. He was quite ready to do anything that was wanted of him--to make up his mind on any political subject on the shortest notice, and sign anything that was thought desirable; but as for personal enthusiasm on the subject, or excitement in the possibility of being elected member for the county, I am afraid Val was as little moved as the terrier he was caressing. Perhaps, however, he was all the more qualified on that account to carry the traditionary principles of the Rosses to the head of the poll, and to vote as his fathers had voted before him, when they had the chance,--or would have voted had they had the chance. Val was setting out on his travels when this warning was given. He was going to see his father in Florence, and, under his auspices, to visit Italy generally, which was a very pleasant prospect. Up to this time he had done the whole duty of boy in this world; and now he had taken his degree, and had a right to the prouder title of man. Not that Val was very much changed from his Eton days. He was still slim and slight, notwithstanding all his boating. His brown complexion was a trifle browner, if that were possible, with perpetual exposure to the sun; his hair as full of curls, and as easily ruffled as ever, rising up like a crest from his bold brown forehead; and I do not think he had yet got his temper under command, though its hasty flashes were always repented of the moment after. “A quick temper, not an ill temper,” Lady Eskside said; and she made out that Valentine Ross, the tenth lord, her husband’s father--he whose portrait in the library her son called “a Raeburn,” and between whom and Val she had already attempted to establish a resemblance--was very hasty and hot-tempered too; which was an infinite comfort to her, as proving that Val got his temper in the legitimate way--“from his own family”--and not through that inferior channel, “his mother’s blood.” He was slightly excited about the visit to his father, and about his first progress alone into the great world--much more excited, I am sorry to say, than he was about representing the county; but on that point Lord Eskside did everything that was necessary, filling up what was wanting on Valentine’s part in interest and emotion. He had again filled Rosscraig with a party which made the woods ring with their guns all morning, and talked politics all night; and there was not a voter of importance in the whole county who had not already been “sounded,” one way or other, as to how he meant to dispose of his vote. “The first thing to be done is to make sure of keeping the Radicals out,” Lord Eskside said; for, indeed, a Whig lawyer was known to be poising on well-balanced wing, ready to sweep down upon a constituency which had always been stanch--faithful among the faithless known. The present Member, I must explain, was in weak health;