the house-steward, copied secret papers for Mr. Ferrars, and when that
gentleman was out of office acted as his private secretary. Mr. Rodney
was the most official person in the ministerial circle. He considered
human nature only with reference to office. No one was so intimately
acquainted with all the details of the lesser patronage as himself,
and his hours of study were passed in the pages of the "Peerage" and in
penetrating the mysteries of the "Royal Calendar."

The events of 1832, therefore, to this gentleman were scarcely a less
severe blow than to the Ferrars family itself. Indeed, like his chief,
he looked upon himself as the victim of a revolution. Mr. Rodney had
always been an admirer of Sylvia, but no more. He had accompanied her
to the theatre, and had attended her to the park, but this was quite
understood on both sides only to be gallantry; both, perhaps, in their
prosperity, with respect to the serious step of life, had indulged in
higher dreams. But the sympathy of sorrow is stronger than the sympathy
of prosperity. In the darkness of their lives, each required comfort: he
murmured some accents of tender solace, and Sylvia agreed to become Mrs.
Rodney.

When they considered their position, the prospect was not free from
anxiety. To marry and then separate is, where there is affection,
trying. His income would secure them little more than a roof, but how to
live under that roof was a mystery. For her to become a governess, and
for him to become a secretary, and to meet only on an occasional Sunday,
was a sorry lot. And yet both possessed accomplishments or acquirements
which ought in some degree to be productive. Rodney had a friend, and he
determined to consult him.

That friend was no common person; he was Mr. Vigo, by birth a