called "the Castle" (the unruly Radicals had not blackened it then,) and remembered how, on its memorable rock, the fated Stuart first unfurled the standard of war against his own people and parliament, and how unweariedly the high-souled and incorruptible Hutchinson sustained the harassments of petty faction so long on the same spot. These more weighty thoughts, especially, visited him as his boyhood began to ripen into youth. And as soon as his understanding began to mature, and he became capable of combining the useful with the comely, in his delights and preferences, he could derive almost as much pleasure from a walk round the splendid area of the market-place of his native town, as from a stroll in the park, or by the Trent. He was often told there was no market-place like it in England; and he felt as proud of its superb space and neat ornamental piazzas, as if he were a man, and owner of half the buildings round it. Diggory Lawson, therefore, had not yet become "the lad who felt like a fish out of water." Neither did Dig at all resemble such an unfortunate animal for the three years, that is to say, from fourteen to seventeen, that he passed at his father's humble trade. Every leisure season was spent in literature; and he had not only read some hundreds of volumes by the time that he had reached the age of seventeen, but he had made some attempts at original composition that were by no means contemptible. The lad was happy enough, and was likely to make a happy and useful man, had "Luck"--that spirit with so questionable a name--kept out of his father's way, and thereby prevented the father from placing himself in Dig's way. The brilliant but evanescent "Bobbin-net" speculation sprung up, like a forest of mushrooms--with an immense surface of promise, but very slender stalk for continuance--in the town of Nottingham. Diggory's father was just the man to jump into a new scheme; and he really jumped into the bobbin-net speculation to some purpose, apparently, for he realised a thousand pounds' profit in twelve months. Such "luck," of course, determined him to continue in the pursuit of money, in the same line; but he was seized, alas! with a vehement resolution to make Dig into a gentleman!