Pray, allow me to ask, sir, are you a medical man ?" "Not at all," replied the other; "I never received a medical education, and yet I perform a great number of cures." "Then, sir," said Woodward, "I take it, with every respect, that you must be a quack." "Did you ever know a quack to work a cure without medicine ?" replied the other; "I cure without medicine, and that is more than the quack is able to do with it; I consequently, cannot be a quack." "Then, in the devil's name, what are you ?" asked Woodward, who felt that his extraordinary fellow-traveller was amusing himself at his expense.
"I reply to no interrogatory urged upon such authority," said the stranger; "but let me advise you, young man, not to allow that mysterious and malignant power which you seem to possess to gratify itself by injury to your fellow-creatures.

Let it be the principal purpose of your life to serve them by every means within your reach, otherwise you will neglect to your cost those great duties for which God created you.

Farewell, my friend, and remember my words; for they are uttered in a spirit of kindness and good feeling." They had now arrived at cross-roads; the stranger turned to the right, and Woodward proceeded, as directed, toward Rathfillan House, the residence of his father.
The building was a tolerably large and comfortable one, without any pretence to architectural beauty.

It had a plain porch before the hall-door, with a neat lawn, through which wound a pretty drive up to the house.

On each side of the lawn was a semicircle of fine old trees, that gave an ancient appearance to the whole place.
Now, one might imagine that Woodward would have felt his heart bound with affection and delight on his return to all that ought to have been dear to him after so long an absence.