benches for such of the tenantry as came to him or his agent on
business--its walls garnished with abstracts of the Game and Poor Law
Enactments--its worn old chairs and heavy oak presses, the open doors of
some of which disclosed bundles of old papers, parchments, etc.--this
little room, the only one almost ever seen by any save the aristocracy
and their followers--exercised and contained frequently more of human
hope and fear than any other or the whole of the others of this
sumptuous edifice. Here the toil-worn farmer came to pay his dues to the
Lord of the Manor--here often too with beating heart and quivering lip,
the old servant of the soil came to beg for time--time to enable him by
hard pinching to make up his proportion of the sum spent in luxury by
his landlord. Ah! reader! could those old walls reveal the sounds, the
tales of human suffering, of heartless avarice, and callous
indifference--of sneering assumption and hopeless woe, thy brain would
be as fire, thy heart would sicken, and thy blood would boil, till
rushing over every prudent thought, through grinding teeth and
passion-paling lips would start, the one wild word, Revenge!

I have said the room was plainly furnished, but there was one
exception--the chair in which the Earl sat. This was an old one,
formerly the chair of state in which the old Barons his ancestors had
presided at many a scene of wassail, with their retainers. It had been
stuffed and new-covered to suit modern luxury, but the armorial bearings
remained still carved in the wood of the high back, with the proud
motto, "Nulli Secundi," second to none.

The Earl was not alone. His agent, a hard-featured man of business, sat
at a desk, busy with papers, and a venerable old man, who had been his
father's steward, stood a little behind his chair. There was a frown on
the brow of the nobleman, as after a stern glance at the old man, he