no visible sign of the coming ruin.  It is recorded of a brother prodigal, that after enormous losses and expenses, his steward informed him that if he would but consent to live upon seven thousand a year for the next ten years, the estate would recover itself.  “Sir,” returned he in anger, “I would rather die than live on seven thousand a year.”  Our Carew would have given the same reply had twice that income been suggested to him, and been applauded for the gallant answer.  The hint of any necessity for curtailment would probably have caused him to double his expenditure forthwith, though, indeed, that would have been difficult to effect.  He had already two packs of hounds, with which he hunted on alternate days, and he had even endeavored to do so on the Sunday; but the obsequious “county” had declined to go with him to that extent, and this anomaly of the nineteenth century had been compelled to confine himself on the seventh day to cock-fighting in the library.  He kept a bear to bait (as well as a chaplain to bully), and ferrets ran loose about Crompton as mice do in other houses.  He had a hunter for every week in the year, yet he often rode his horses to death.  He had a stud of racers, and it was this, or rather his belief in their powers, which eventually drained his vast resources.  Not one of them ever won a great race.  This was not their fault, nor that of their trainer, but his own; he interfered in their management, and would have things his own way; he would command every thing, except success, which was beyond his power, and in missing that he lost all.  Otherwise, he was lucky as a mere gambler.  His audacity, and the funds he always had at his disposal, carried him triumphantly, where many a more prudent but less wealthy player withdrew from the contest.  Games of skill had no attraction for him, but at an earlier date in his career he had been a terror to the club-keepers in St. James’s, where his luck and obstinacy had broken a dozen banks.  It was said—­and very likely with truth—­that he had once cut double or quits for ten thousand pounds.

His moral character, as respected the softer sex, was such as you might expect from these traits.  No modest woman had been seen at Crompton for many a year; although not a few such—­if at least good birth and high position include modesty—­had, since his majority, striven to give a lawful mistress to the place.  His eccentricities had not alarmed them, and his shamelessness had not abashed them.  Though his constitution was said to be breaking up through unparalleled excesses, his heart, it was currently reported in domestic circles, was sound:  and what a noble feat would it be to reclaim him!  It was also reckoned impossible that any amount of extravagance could have seriously embarrassed such a property as he had inherited, indeed long since, but of which he had had the sole control only a few years.  At the time of which we speak Carew was but thirty-five, though he looked much older.  His muscles were