like his ancestors, he was proud of hearing as a sort of surname the
knightly title of Headbreaker, hereditary in the original Mauprat stock.
As for the elder branch, it had turned out so badly, or rather had
preserved from the old feudal days such terrible habits of brigandage,
that it had won for itself the distinctive title of Hamstringer. [I
hazard "Headbreaker" and "Hamstringer" as poor equivalents for the
"Casse-Tete" and "Coupe-Jarret" of the French.--TR.] Of the sons of
Tristan, my father, the eldest, was the only one who married. I was his
only child. Here it is necessary to mention a fact of which I was long
ignorant. Hubert de Mauprat, on hearing of my birth, begged me of my
parents, undertaking to make me his heir if he were allowed absolute
control over my education. At a shooting-party about this time my
father was killed by an accidental shot, and my grandfather refused the
chevalier's offer, declaring that his children were the sole legitimate
heirs of the younger branch, and that consequently he would resist with
all his might any substitution in my favour. It was then that Hubert's
daughter was born. But when, seven years later, his wife died leaving
him this one child, the desire, so strong in the nobles of that time, to
perpetuate their name, urged him to renew his request to my mother. What
her answer was I do not know; she fell ill and died. The country doctors
again brought in a verdict of iliac passion. My grandfather had spent
the last two days she passed in this world with her.

Pour me out a glass of Spanish wine; for I feel a cold shiver running
through my body. It is nothing serious--merely the effect that these
early recollections have on me when I begin to narrate them. It will
soon pass off.

He swallowed a large glass of wine, and we did the same; for a sensation
of cold came upon us too as we gazed at his stern face and listened to