On a peg on the door that led to the staircase, still hung his rough driving coat.

The window commanded the view of the paddock in which the worn-out hunter or the unbroken colt grazed at will.

Around the walls of the "study"-- (a strange misnomer!)--hung prints of celebrated fox-hunts and renowned steeple-chases: guns, fishing-rods, and foxes' brushes, ranged with a sportsman's neatness, supplied the place of books.

On the mantelpiece lay a cigar-case, a well-worn volume on the Veterinary Art, and the last number of the Sporting Magazine.

And in the room--thus witnessing of the hardy, masculine, rural life, that had passed away--sallow, stooping, town-worn, sat, I say, Robert Beaufort, the heir-at-law,--alone: for the very day of the death he had remanded his son home with the letter that announced to his wife the change in their fortunes, and directed her to send his lawyer post-haste to the house of death.