“Poor fellow,” replied Norton, “that’s too bad.  Here’s a pound note for you, at all events.  Not a word now; if we can understand each other you sha’n’t want; and I’ll tell you what you’ll do.  After leaving his lordship you must come to my room, where you can have punch to the eyes, and there will be no interruption to our chat.  You can then tell me anything you like; but it must come willingly, for I’d scorn to force a secret from any man—­that is, if it is a secret.  Do you agree to this?”

“I agree to it, and many thanks, worthy sir,” replied M’Bride, putting the pound note in his pocket; after which they chatted upon indifferent matters until the period for his interview with Lord Cullamore had arrived.

Ginty, who had not lost a syllable of this dialogue, to whom, as the reader perhaps may suspect, it was no novelty, followed them at a safe distance, until she saw them enter the house.  The interest, however, which she felt in M’Bride’s movements, prevented her from going home, or allowing him to slip through her finger without accomplishing a project that she had for some time before meditated, but had hitherto found no opportunity to execute.

Lord Cullamore, on M’Bride’s entrance, was in much the same state which we have already described, except that in bodily appearance he was somewhat more emaciated and feeble.  There was, however, visible in his features a tone of solemn feeling, elevated but sorrowful, that seemed to bespeak a heart at once resigned and suffering, and disposed to receive the dispensations of life as a man would whose philosophy was softened by a Christian spirit.  In the general plan of life he clearly recognized the wisdom which, for the example and the benefit of all, runs with singular beauty through the infinite combinations of human action, verifying the very theory which the baronet saw dimly, but doubted; we mean that harmonious adaptation of moral justice to those actions by which the original principles that diffuse happiness through social life are disregarded and violated.  The very order that characterizes all creation, taught him that we are not here without a purpose, and when human nature failed to satisfy him upon the mystery of life, he went to revelation, and found the problem solved.  The consequence was, that whilst he felt as a man, he endured as a Christian—­aware that this life is, for purposes which we cannot question, chequered with evils that teach us the absolute necessity of another, and make us, in the meantime, docile and submissive to the will of him who called us into being.

His lordship had been reading the Bible as M’Bride entered, and, after having closed it, and placed his spectacles between the leaves as a mark, he motioned the man to come forward.

“Well,” said he, “have you brought those documents with you?”

“I have, my lord.”

“Pray,” said he, “allow me to see them.”

M’Bride hesitated; being a knave himself, he naturally suspected every other man of trick and dishonesty; and yet, when he looked upon the mild but dignified countenance of the old man, made reverend by age and suffering, he had not the courage to give any intimation of the base suspicions he entertained.