Ah! how heartless it all sounds, and yet how ridiculous! Dear Cousin John, haven't I bored you?
Let us go in." With characteristic energy John Crewys set in hand the repairs which he had declared to be so necessary.
The late squire had apparently been as well aware of the neglected state of his ancestral halls as of his tangled and overgrown woods; but he had also, it seemed, been unable to make up his mind to take any steps towards amending the condition of either--or to part with his ever-increasing balance at his bankers'.
Sir Timothy had carried both his obstinacy and his dullness into his business affairs.
The family solicitor, Mr.Crawley, backed up the new administrator with all his might.
"Over sixty thousand pounds uninvested, and lying idle at the bank," he said, lifting his hands and eyes, "and one long, miserable grumbling over the expense of keeping up Barracombe.

One good tenant after another lost because the landlord would keep nothing in repair; gardener after gardener leaving for want of a shilling increase in weekly wages.

In case Sir Peter should turn out to resemble his father, we had best not let the grass grow under our feet, Mr.
Crewys," said the shrewd gentleman, chuckling, "but take full advantage of the powers entrusted to you for the next two years and a quarter.

Sir Peter, luckily, does not come of age until October, 1902." "That is just what I intend to do," said John.
"Odd, isn't it," said the lawyer, confidentially, "how often a man will put unlimited power into the hands of a comparative stranger, and leave his own son tied hand and foot?
Not a penny of all this capital will Sir Peter ever have the handling of.

Perhaps a good job too.
Oh, dear! when I look at the state of his affairs in general, I feel positively guilty, and ashamed to have had even the nominal management of them.