"Well, patience and hope. Are you are not a rich uncle's heir?"

"I don't know," said Ferrers, very dolorously; "the old gentleman has
married again, and may have a family."

"Married!--to whom?"

"A widow, I hear; I know nothing more, except that she has a child
already. So you see she has got into a cursed way of having children.
And perhaps, by the time I'm forty, I shall see a whole covey of cherubs
flying away with the great Templeton property!"

"Ha, ha; your despair sharpens your wit, Lumley; but why not take a leaf
out of your uncle's book, and marry yourself?"

"So I will when I can find an heiress. If that is what you meant to
say--it is a more sensible suggestion than any I could have supposed to
come from a man who writes books, especially poetry: and your advice is
not to be despised. For rich I will be; and as the fathers (I don't
mean of the Church, but in Horace) told the rising generation, the first
thing is to resolve to be rich, it is only the second thing to consider
how."

"Meanwhile, Ferrers, you will be my guest."

"I'll dine with you to-day; but to-morrow I am off to Fulham, to be
introduced to my aunt. Can't you fancy her?--grey /gros-de-Naples/
gown: gold chain with an eyeglass; rather fat; two pugs, and a parrot!
'Start not, this is fancy's sketch!' I have not yet seen the
respectable relative with my physical optics. What shall we have for