Michael ended his stay with his great-aunt shortly afterwards, returning home with a budget of legends founded on his waterside experience. As he had a reputation for audacious falsehood without foundation, it is no matter of surprise that the whole story of the water-rat's death and the inquest were looked upon as exaggerations too outrageous for belief even by the most credulous. Probably his version of the incidents, owing to its rich substratum of the marvellous yet true, was much more accurate than was usual with him when the marvellous depended on his ingenuity to provide it. It was, however, roundly discredited in his own circle, and nothing in it could have evoked recognition in Sapps Court even if the name of the convict had reached the ears that knew it. For it was not only wrongly reported but was still further distorted by Michael for purposes of astonishment. CHAPTER X OF THE EARLDOM OF ANCESTER, AND ITS EARL'S COUNTESS'S OPINION OF HIM. HOW HER SECOND DAUGHTER CAME OUT IN THE GARDEN. HOW SHE SAW A TRESPASSER, WITH SUCH A NICE DOG! HE MUSTN'T BE SHOT, _COUTE QUE COUTE_! A LITTLE STONE BRIDGE. A SLIT IN A DOG'S COLLAR. OLD MICHAEL'S OBSTINACY. HOW GWENDOLEN RAN AWAY TO DRESS, AND WAS UNSOCIABLE AT DINNER. THE VOICE OF A DOG IN TROUBLE. ACHILLES, AND HIS RECOGNITION. HOW THEY FOLLOWED ACHILLES, AT HIS OWN REQUEST, AND WHAT HE SHOWED THE WAY TO. BUT THE MAN WAS NOT DEAD If a stranger from America or Australia could have been shown at a glance all that went to make up the Earldom of Ancester, he would have been deeply impressed. All the leagues of parkland, woodland, moorland, farmland that were its inheritance would have impressed him, not because of their area--because Americans and Australians are accustomed to mere crude area in their own departments of the planet--but because of the amazing amount of old-world History transacted within its limits; the way the antecedent Earls meddled in it; their magnificent record of treachery and bloodshed and murder; wholesale in battle, retail in less showy, but perhaps even more interesting, private assassination; fascinating cruelties and horrors unspeakable! They might have been impressed also, though, of course, in a less degree, by the Earldom's very creditable show of forbears who, at the risk of being uninteresting, behaved with common decency, and did their duty in the station to which God or Debrett had called them; not drawing the sword to decide a dispute until they had tried one or two of the less popular expedients, and slighting their obligations to the Melodrama of the future. Which rightly looks for its supplies of copy to persons of high birth and low principles.