Many of the tenants and retainers at the Towers remembered how John began by glueing walnut shells filled with pitch on the paws of the housekeeper's favourite Tomcat, and ended by tying him on a goose's back and setting them off together on the lake, enjoying the sight of the cat tearing the bird's back with his long claws, and the bird diving to drown her rapacious enemy. Every kind of cruelty, from spinning cockchafers on a pin, and turning birds plucked of their feathers alive into the woods, to the worse scenes of the cockpit and badger baiting, amused him till he became ten years old, or thereabout, when he was sent to Harrow. Naturally of a depraved character, it was his own bad heart that suggested these crimes, and not bad example, for his elder brother, the Earl, had none of these tastes but spent his time shooting or riding, and gained the character of a famous sportsman in all the neighbourhood. The old Earl, who lived till John was thirteen or fourteen, was often told of these early signs of depravity, but would only call him a "sad fellow," a "naughty, cruel boy," and "he would grow wiser when he got older." Augusta too used to speak often to him, but he was of that age when boys generally despise the other sex, and not only turned a deaf ear to her admonitions, but called her a silly, chicken-hearted girl, and said that men never thought of such things. If his father went fox-hunting, why should he not hunt cats? When John went to Harrow, he soon became the leader and chieftain of a set of boys as bad as himself. He was, however, obliged to fag, and his master happened to be the Marquis of Arranmore, then Earl of Claremont, who was an easy-going, good-natured sort of fellow, and though he once or twice gave him a hiding, was on the whole a very merciful lord. Young Musgrave was also a boy at Harrow; and these two, equally bad, Musgrave in the scheming and John in the acting part of their juvenile scrapes, were the chosen leaders in every row. If there was an orchard robbed, windows broken, farmers' fields trampled over--the head offender was John de Vere; the planner of the action, Musgrave. From Harrow, Musgrave and John de Vere went to a military college to prepare for the army, and here they set out on a bolder line. The theatre and saloon were their nightly rendezvous, and men of wicked character their companions in idle hours. Occasionally they took excursions to town, and flew with avidity to every kind of vicious pleasure. They then entered the 7th Hussars together, into which regiment L'Estrange exchanged; and the three young men soon became prime leaders in every folly and dissipation, then more common than now. Their colonel, Sir Harry Maynard, overlooked many a breach of military discipline in consideration of youth and inexperience; possibly the well-filled purse of the young officer De Vere, his excellent champagne suppers, &c., made a balance in favour of