sagacious stiff fingers, and crushed his soul while, in an infallible
voice, declaring him the animal he was making him feel such an animal!
Not only his blossoms withered, his being seemed to draw in its shoots
and twigs. And when, coupled thereunto (the strange man having departed,
his work done), his father, in his tenderest manner, stated that it would
give him pleasure to see those same precocious, utterly valueless,
scribblings among the cinders, the last remaining mental blossoms
spontaneously fell away. Richard's spirit stood bare. He protested not.
Enough that it could be wished! He would not delay a minute in doing it.
Desiring his father to follow him, he went to a drawer in his room, and
from a clean-linen recess, never suspected by Sir Austin, the secretive
youth drew out bundle after bundle: each neatly tied, named, and
numbered: and pitched them into flames. And so Farewell my young
Ambition! and with it farewell all true confidence between Father and
Son.




CHAPTER XIII

It was now, as Sir Austin had written it down, The Magnetic Age: the Age
of violent attractions, when to hear mention of love is dangerous, and to
see it, a communication of the disease. People at Raynham were put on
their guard by the baronet, and his reputation for wisdom was severely
criticized in consequence of the injunctions he thought fit to issue
through butler and housekeeper down to the lower household, for the
preservation of his son from any visible symptom of the passion. A
footman and two housemaids are believed to have been dismissed on the
report of heavy Benson that they were in or inclining to the state; upon