Family differences and unpleasantnesses seem to have been the actual, even if remote, cause of the great imposition of Arthur Orton.  Had matters been conducted as one might have anticipated they would among people blessed with the means of gratifying every whim and caprice, Roger Tichborne would have lived and died like other men, and his name would never have been known except as a quiet country gentleman of English origin and French tastes, which led him into more or less eccentricities, and caused him to be more or less popular among his neighbours and dependants.  But this was not to be.  All great families have their secret unpleasantnesses, and in these the Tichbornes were by no means behindhand.  The Tichbornes generally had a knack of disagreeing, and this feeling was shown in excelsis by James, the father of Roger, and his wife, who lived abroad for many years, she being French in every sentiment, while the husband was but naturalized, and now and again exhibited a desire to return to his native land.  When Roger was born there was but little chance of his ever becoming the owner of either titles or estates, and so his education was entirely foreign, his tutors being M. Chatillon, and a priest named Lefevre.  As time wore on, it became evident that Mr. James Tichborne would in due course become Sir James, and he felt it his duty to secure to his son an English education.  This the mother opposed most strenuously, and it was only by artifice that the boy was brought to England.  Sir Henry Joseph Tichborne, who had succeeded to the baronetcy in 1821, had no son, and though time after time a child was born to him, Providence blessed him with no male heir.  Again and again a child would be born at Tichborne, but it was always a girl.  Sir Henry had seven children, of whom six lived, all celebrated for their good looks, and their tall and handsome proportions; but all were daughters.  Still there was Sir Henry’s brother, Edward Tichborne, who had taken large estates under the will of a Miss Doughty—­which led to the present junction of the Doughty and Tichborne properties, and to the double surname—­and with them had assumed the name of that lady, and he was after Sir Henry the next heir.  Edward had a son and daughter.  But one day there came the news to James and his wife in France, that Sir Edward’s little boy had died, and then it was that the father perceived more clearly the error that he had made in permitting Roger to grow up ignorant of English habits and the English tongue.  Edward Doughty was an old man.  His brother James Tichborne himself was growing in years.  The prospect of Roger one day becoming the head of the old house of Tichborne, which had once been so remote, had now become almost a certainty.  It would not do for the Lord of Tichborne to be a Frenchman; sooner or later he must learn English, and receive an education fitting him to take the position which now appeared in store for him.  All this was clear enough to Mr. James,