For when I reached Hopton my father had already been laid in the old churchyard beneath the shadow of the crumbling walls of the ruined church, which is now no longer used.

They have built a gaudy new edifice farther inland, but so long as a Howard owns Hopton Hall, we shall, I think, continue to lie in the graveyard nearer to the sea.
I suppose we are a quarrelsome race, for I fell foul of several persons almost as soon as I arrived.

The lawyers vowed that there were difficulties--but none, I protest, but what such parchment minds as theirs would pause to heed.

One thing, however, was certain.

Did I not read it in black and white myself?
My obstinate old father--and, by gad! I respect him for it--had held to his purpose.