CHAPTER I.
THE EXPEDITION.
It was in the autumn of the year 1828, that an elderly and infirm gentleman was slowly pacing up and down in a large dining-room.

He had apparently finished his dinner, although it was not yet five o'clock, and the descending sun shone bright and warm through the windows, which were level with the ground, and from which there was a view of a spacious park, highly ornamented with old timber.

He held a newspaper in one hand, and had the other behind his back, as if for support, for he was bent forward, and looked very feeble and emaciated.
After pacing for some time, he sat down in an easy chair and remained in deep thought, holding the newspaper in both his hands.
This old gentleman's name was Sir Charles Wilmot.

He had in early life gone out to India as a writer, and after remaining there for a few years, during which he had amassed a handsome fortune, was advised to leave the country for a time on account of his health.

He returned to England on furlough, and had not been there more than six months when the death, without issue, of his eldest brother, Sir Henry Wilmot, put him in possession of the entailed estates and of the baronetcy.
This decided him not to return to India for his wife and three daughters, whom he had left out there, but to write, desiring them to return home by the first ship.