Thus abandoned by its sons, and denuded of the strongest elements of life, it may well be supposed that the castle at Penninghame was a melancholy house. What more easy than to conjure up the saddest picture of such a dwelling? The old man, seated in his desolate home, brooding over perhaps the sins of his sons, perhaps his own--some injudicious indulgence, or untimely severity which had driven them from him; while the sister, worn out by the monotony of her solitary life, shut herself out from all society, and spent her life in longing for the absent, and pleading for them--a sad, solitary woman, with no pleasure in her lot, except that of the past. The picture would have been as appropriate as touching, but it would not have been true. Old Mr. Musgrave was not the erring father of romance. He was a well-preserved and spare little man, over seventy, with cheeks of streaky red like winter apples, and white hair, which he wore rather long, falling on the velvet collar of his old-fashioned coat. He had been an outdoor man in his day, and had farmed, and shot, and hunted, like others of his kind, so far as his straitened means and limited stables permitted; but when years and circumstances had impaired his activity he had been strong enough to retire, of his own free will, while graceful abdication was still in his power. He spent most of his time now in his library, with only a constitutional walk, or easy ramble upon his steady old cob, to vary his life, except when quarter sessions called him forth, or any other duty of the magistracy, to which he still paid the most conscientious attention. The Musgraves were not people whom it was easy to crush, and Fate had a hard bargain in the old squire, who found himself one occupation when deprived of another with a spirit not often existing in old age. He had committed plenty of mistakes in his day, and some which had been followed by tragical consequences, a practical demonstration of evil which fortunately does not attend all the errors of life; but he did not brood over them in his old library, nor indulge unavailing compunctions, nor consider himself under any doom; but on the contrary studied his favourite problems in genealogy and heraldry, and county history, and corresponded with _Notes and Queries_, and was in his way very comfortable. He it was who first pointed out that doubtful blazoning of Marmion’s shield, “colour upon colour,” which raised so lively a discussion; and in questions of this kind he was an authority, and thoroughly enjoyed the little tilts and controversies involved, many of which were as warm as their subjects were insignificant. His family was dropping, or rather had dropped, into decay; his eldest son was virtually lost to his family and to society; his youngest son alienated and a stranger; and some of this at least was the father’s fault. But neither the decay of the house, nor the reflection that he was at least