But the man was not perfect, and his latest practical undertaking curiously enough illustrated the failing which he seemed most completely to have outgrown.  It was of course a deplorable error to think of mining in the beautiful valley which had once been the Eldons’ estate.  Richard Mutimer could not perceive that.  He was a very old man, and possibly the instincts of his youth revived as his mind grew feebler; he imagined it the greatest kindness to Mrs. Eldon and her son to increase as much as possible the value of the property he would leave at his death.  They, of course, could not even hint to him the pain with which they viewed so barbarous a scheme; he did not as much as suspect a possible objection.  Intensely happy in his discovery and the activity to which it led, he would have gone to his grave rich in all manner of content but for that fatal news which reached him from London, where Hubert Eldon was sup posed to be engaged in sober study in an interval of University work.  Doubtless it was this disappointment that caused his sudden death, and so brought about a state of things which could he have foreseen it, would have occasioned him the bitterest grief.

He had never lost sight of his relatives in London, and had made for them such modest provision as suited his view of the fitness of things.  To leave wealth to young men of the working class would have seemed to him the most inexcusable of follies; if such were to rise at all, it must be by their own efforts and in consequence of their native merits; otherwise, let them toil on and support themselves honestly.  From secret sources he received information of the capabilities and prospects of Joseph Mutimer’s children, and the items of his will were regulated accordingly.

So we return to the family in Wilton Square.  Let us, before proceeding with the story, enumerate the younger Mutimers.  The first-born, now aged five-and-twenty, had his great-uncle’s name; Joseph Mutimer, married, and no better off in worldly possessions than when be had only himself to support, came to regret the coldness with which he had received the advances of his uncle the capitalist, and christened his son Richard, with half a hope that some day the name might stand the boy in stead.  Richard was a mechanical engineer, employed in certain ironworks where hydraulic machinery was made.  The second child was a girl, upon whom had been bestowed the names Alice Maud, after one of the Queen’s daughters; on which account, and partly with reference to certain personal characteristics, she was often called ‘the Princess.’  Her age was nineteen, and she had now for two years been employed in the show-rooms of a City warehouse.  Last comes Henry, a lad of seventeen; he had been suffered to aim at higher things than the rest of the family.  In the industrial code of precedence the rank of clerk is a step above that of mechanic, and Henry—­known to relatives and friends as ’Arry—­occupied the proud position of clerk in a drain-pipe manufactory.