Eager to secure for her darling Algernon those advantages which his brother Mark had so uncourteously declined, Mrs. Hurdlestone laid close siege to the heart of the old Squire, over whom she possessed an influence only second to that of her eldest son.  In this daring assault upon the old man’s purse and prejudices, she was vigorously assisted by Uncle Alfred, who had a double object to attain in carrying his point.  Many were the desperate battles they had to fight with the old Squire’s love of money, and his misanthropic disposition, before their object was accomplished, or he would deign to pay the least attention to their proposition.  Defeated a thousand times, they returned with unwearied perseverance to the charge, often laughing in secret over their defeat, or exulting in the least advantage they fancied that they had gained.

Time, which levels mountains and overthrows man’s proudest structures, at length sapped the resolutions of the old man, although they appeared at first to have been written upon his heart in adamant.  The truth is, that he was a man of few words, and, next to talking himself, he hated to be talked to, and still more to be talked at; and Mrs. Hurdlestone and brother Alfred had never ceased to talk to him, and at him, for the last three months, and always upon the one eternal theme—­Algernon’s removal to college, and his travels abroad.

His patience was exhausted; human endurance could stand it no longer; and he felt that if Ear-gate was to be stormed much longer on the same subject, he should go mad, and be driven from the field.  A magic word had been whispered in his ear by his eldest son.  “Father, let him go:  think how happy and quiet we shall be at home, when this hopeful uncle and nephew are away.”

This hint was enough:  the old man capitulated without another opposing argument, and consented to what he termed the ruin of his youngest son.  How Mrs. Hurdlestone and Uncle Alfred triumphed in the victory they thought they had obtained!—­yet it was all owing to that one sentence from the crafty lips of Mark, muttered into the ear of the old man.  Algernon was to go to Oxford, and after the completion of his studies there, make the tour of the Continent, accompanied by his uncle.  This was the extent of Mrs. Hurdlestone’s ambition; and many were her private instructions to her gay, thoughtless son, to be merry and wise, and not draw too frequently upon his father’s purse.  The poor lady might as well have lectured to the winds, as preached on prudence to Uncle Alfred’s accomplished pupil; for both had determined to fling off all restraint the moment they left the shade of the Oak Hall groves behind them.

Algernon was so elated with his unexpected emancipation from the tyrannical control of his father and brother, that he left the stately old house with as little regret as a prisoner would do who had been confined for years in some magnificent castle, which had been converted into a county jail, and, from the force of melancholy associations, had lost all its original beauty in his eyes.  The world was now within his grasp—­its busy scenes all before him:  these he expected to find replete with happiness and decked with flowers.