The next day, between two and three o’clock, a visitor, on particular business, was announced to Lord Cullamore; and on being desired to walk up, our friend Birney made his bow to his lordship.  Having been desired to take a seat, he sat down, and his lordship, who appeared to be very feeble, looked inquiringly at him, intimating thereby that he waited to know the object of his visit.

“My lord,” said the attorney, “in the whole course of my professional life, a duty so painful as this has never devolved upon me.  I come supported with proofs sufficient to satisfy you that your title and property cannot descend to your son, Lord Dunroe.”

“I have no other son, sir,” said his lordship, reprovingly.

“I do not mean to insinuate that you have, my lord.  I only assert that he who is supposed to be the present heir, is not really so at all.”

“Upon what proofs, sir, do you ground that assertion?”

“Upon proofs, my lord, the most valid and irrefragable; proofs that cannot be questioned, even for a moment; and, least of all, by your lordship, who are best acquainted with their force and authenticity.”

“Have you got them about you?”

“I have got copies of the documentary proofs, my lord, and I shall now place them before you.”

“Yes; have the goodness to let me see them.”

Birney immediately handed him the documents, and mentioned the facts of which they were the proofs.  In fact, only one of them was absolutely necessary, and that was simply the record of a death duly and regularly attested.

The old man seemed struck with dismay; for, until this moment he had not been clearly in possession of the facts which were now brought against him, as they were stated, and made plain as to their results, by Mr. Birney.

“I do not know much of law,” he said, “but enough, I think, to satisfy me, that unless you have other and stronger proofs than this, you cannot succeed in disinheriting my son.  I have seen the originals of those before, but I had forgotten some facts and dates connected with them at the time.”

“We have the collateral proof you speak of, my lord, and can produce personal evidence to corroborate those which I have shown you.”

“May I ask who that evidence is?”

“A Mrs. Mainwaring, my lord—­formerly Norton—­who had been maid to your first wife while she resided privately in Prance—­was a witness to her death, and had it duly registered.”

“But even granting this, I think you will be called on to prove the intention on my part:  that which a man does in ignorance cannot, and ought not to be called a violation of the law.”