We have now brought down to the opening of our narrative the general
records of the family it concerns; we have reserved our account of the
rearing and the character of the personage most important, perhaps, in
the development of its events,--Lucretia Clavering,--in order to place
singly before the reader the portrait of her dark, misguided, and ill-
boding youth.




CHAPTER II.

LUCRETIA.

When Lucretia first came to the house of Sir Miles St. John she was an
infant about four years old. The baronet then lived principally in
London, with occasional visits rather to the Continent or a watering-
place than to his own family mansion. He did not pay any minute
attention to his little ward, satisfied that her nurse was sedulous, and
her nursery airy and commodious. When, at the age of seven, she began to
interest him, and he himself, approaching old age, began seriously to
consider whether he should select her as his heiress, for hitherto he had
not formed any decided or definite notions on the matter, he was startled
by a temper so vehement, so self-willed and sternly imperious, so
obstinately bent upon attaining its object, so indifferently contemptuous
of warning, reproof, coaxing, or punishment, that her governess honestly
came to him in despair.

The management of this unmanageable child interested Sir Miles. It