he had some connection with the Press.  She had implicit faith in his powers of constitution, and would affirm, that he had been the death of dozens whom the attraction had duped to imitate his habits.  ’He is now a Field-Marshal on his campaign.’  She betrayed a twinkle of humour.  He must himself have favoured her with that remark.  The report of the house-door frequently shutting in the night suggested the passage of his aides-de-camp.

Early in the morning, I found him pacing through the open doors of the dining-room and the library dictating to a secretary at a desk, now and then tossing a word to Dettermain and Newson’s chief clerk.  The floor was strewn with journals.  He wore Hessian boots; a voluminous black cloak hung loosely from his shoulders.

‘I am just settling the evening papers,’ he said after greeting me, with a show of formality in his warmth; and immediately added, ’That will do, Mr. Jopson.  Put in a note—­” Mr. Harry Lepel Richmond of Riversley and Twn-y-glas, my son, takes no step to official distinction in his native land save through the ordinary Parliamentary channels.”  Your pardon, Richie; presently.  I am replying to a morning paper.’

‘What’s this?  Why print my name?’ I cried.

’Merely the correction of an error.  I have to insist, my dear boy, that you claim no privileges:  you are apart from them.  Mr. Jopson, I beseech you, not a minute’s delay in delivering that.  Fetch me from the printer’s my pamphlet this afternoon.  Mr. Jacobs, my compliments to Dettermain and Newson:  I request them to open proceedings instanter, and let the world know of it.  Good-morning, gentlemen.’

And now, turning to me, my father fenced me with the whole weight of his sententious volubility, which was the force of a river.  Why did my name appear in the papers?  Because I was his son.  But he assured me that he carefully separated me from public companionship with his fortunes, and placed me on the side of my grandfather, as a plain gentleman of England, the heir of the most colossal wealth possible in the country.

’I dis-sociate you from me, Richie, do you see?  I cause it to be declared that you need, on no account, lean on me.  Jopson will bring you my pamphlet—­my Declaration of Rights—­to peruse.  In the Press, in Literature, at Law, and on social ground, I meet the enemy, and I claim my own; by heaven, I do!  And I will down to the squire for a distraction, if you esteem it necessary, certainly.  Half-a-dozen . words to him.  Why, do you maintain him to be insensible to a title for you?  No, no.  And ask my friends.  I refer him to any dozen of my friends to convince him I have the prize almost in my possession.  Why, dear boy, I have witnesses, living witnesses, to the ceremony.  Am I, tell me, to be deprived of money now, once again, for the eleventh time?  Oh!  And put aside my duty to you, I protest I am bound in duty to her who bore me—­you have seen her miniature:  how lovely that dear woman was! how gentle!—­bound in duty to her to clear her good name.  This does not affect you . . . ’