"Ill-natured people did say that those who would not work on Master Lobbit's farm, at _his_ wages, stood a very bad chance if they wanted any thing from the parish, or came for the doles of blankets, coals, bread, and linsey-woolsey petticoats, which, under the provisions of the tablets in Duxmoor church, are distributed every Christmas. Of course, Mr. Lobbit supplied these gifts, as chief shopkeeper, and dispensed them, as senior and perpetual churchwarden. Lobbit gave capital dinners; plenty smoked on his board, and pipes of negro-head with jorums of gin punch followed, without stint. "The two attorneys dined with him—and were glad to come, for he had always money to lend, on good security, and his gin was unexceptionable. So did two or three bullfrog farmers, very rich and very ignorant. The doctor and curate came occasionally; they were poor, and in his debt at 'The Shop,' therefore bound to laugh at his jokes—which were not so bad, for he was no fool—so that, altogether, Mr. Lobbit had reason to believe himself a very popular man. "But there was—where is there not?—a black drop in his overflowing cup of prosperity. "He had a son whom he intended to make a gentleman; whom he hoped to see married to some lady of good family, installed in the manor-house of Duxmoor, (if it should be sold cheap, at the end of the Chancery suit,) and established as the squire of the parish. Robert Lobbit had no taste for learning, and a strong taste for drinking, which his father's customers did their best to encourage. Old Lobbit was decent in his private habits; but, as he made money wherever he could to advantage, he was always surrounded by a levee of scamps, of all degrees—some agents and assistants, some borrowers, and would-be borrowers. Young Lobbit found it easier to follow the example of his father's companions than to follow his father's advice. He was as selfish and greedy as his father, without being so agreeable or hospitable. In the school-room he was a dunce, in the play-ground a tyrant and bully; no one liked him; but, as he had plenty of money, many courted him. "As a last resource his father sent him to Oxford; whence, after a short residence, he was expelled. He arrived home drunk, and in debt; without having lost one bad habit, or made one respectable friend. From that period he lived a sot, a village rake, the king of the taproom, and the patron of a crowd of blackguards, who drank his beer and his health; hated him for his insolence, and cheated him of his money. "Yet Joseph Lobbit loved his son, and tried not to believe the stories good-natured friends told of him.