In this position he might have prospered in a moderate way, and might have profited by the expensive education which had given him nothing but showy agreeable manners, had he been capable of steadiness and industry.

But of these virtues he was utterly deficient, possessing instead a genius for that kind of swindling which keeps just upon the safe side of felony.

He had lived pleasantly enough, for many years, by the exercise of this agreeable talent; so pleasantly indeed that he had troubled himself very little about his chances of inheriting his father's savings.

It was only when he had exhausted all expedients for making money on "the other side" that he turned his thoughts in the direction of Queen Anne's Court, and began to speculate upon the probability of Jacob Nowell's good graces being worth the trouble of cultivation.

The prospectuses which he had shown his father were mere waste paper, the useless surplus stationery remaining from a scheme that had failed to enlist the sympathies of a Transatlantic public.