At length the important hour arrived, and the will was produced in the midst of the expectants, whose looks and gestures formed a group that would have been very entertaining to an unconcerned spectator.

But, the reader can scarce conceive the astonishment and mortification that appeared, when an attorney pronounced aloud, the young squire sole heir of all his grandfather's estate, personal and real.

My uncle, who had listened with great attention, sucking the head of his cudgel all the while, accompanied these words of the attorney with a stare, and whew, that alarmed the whole assembly.

The eldest and pertest of my female competitors, who had been always very officious about my grandfather's person, inquired, with a faltering accent and visage as yellow as an orange, "if there were no legacies ?" and was answered, "None at all." Upon which she fainted away.
The rest, whose expectations, perhaps, were not so sanguine, supported their disappointment with more resolution, though not without giving evident marks of indignation, and grief at least as genuine as that which appeared in them at the old gentleman's death.

My conductor, after having kicked with his heel for some time against the wainscot, began: "So there's no legacy, friend, ha!--here's an old succubus; but somebody's soul howls for it, d--n me!" The parson of the parish, who was one of the executors, and had acted as ghostly director to the old man, no sooner heard this exclamation than he cried out, "Avaunt, unchristian reviler! avaunt! wilt thou not allow the soul of his honour to rest in peace ?" But this zealous pastor did not find himself so warmly seconded, as formerly, by the young ladies, who now joined my uncle against him, and accused him of having acted the part of a busybody with their grandpapa whose ears he had certainly abused by false stories to their prejudice, or else he would not have neglected them in such an unnatural manner.