Conscience waved her back from the solemn offices of nature; she hid her face with her hands, shrank again into her room; and Mr.Fielden, assuming unbidden the responsibility, went alone.
Only Vernon (summoned from Brighton), the good clergyman, and the lawyer, to whom, as sole executor, the will was addressed, and in whose custody it had been left, were present when the seal of the testament was broken.

The will was long, as is common when the dust that it disposes of covers some fourteen or fifteen thousand acres.

But out of the mass of technicalities and repetitions these points of interest rose salient: To Charles Vernon, of Vernon Grange, Esq., and his heirs by him lawfully begotten, were left all the lands and woods and manors that covered that space in the Hampshire map known by the name of the "Laughton property," on condition that he and his heirs assumed the name and arms of St.John; and on the failure of Mr.Vernon's issue, the estate passed, first (with the same conditions) to the issue of Susan Mivers; next to that of Lucretia Clavering.

There the entail ceased; and the contingency fell to the rival ingenuity of lawyers in hunting out, amongst the remote and forgotten descendants of some ancient St.John, the heir-at-law.

To Lucretia Clavering, without a word of endearment, was bequeathed 10,000 pounds,--the usual portion which the house of St.
John had allotted to its daughters; to Susan Mivers the same sum, but with the addition of these words, withheld from her sister: "and my blessing!" To Olivier Dalibard an annuity of 200 pounds a year; to Honore Gabriel Varney, 3,000 pounds; to the Rev.Matthew Fielden, 4,000 pounds; and the same sum to John Walter Ardworth.