property, and not a more recent acquisition of the Winslows.
Moreover, he would do nothing without Clarence's participation.

The title-deeds were not in the house, for my father had had too
much of the law to meddle more than he could help with his own
affairs, and had left them in the hands of the family solicitor at
Bristol, where Clarence was to go and look over them. He rejoiced
in the opportunity of being able to see whether anything would throw
light on the story of the mullion chamber; and the certainty that
the Wattlesea property had never been part of the old endowment of
the Chantry did not seem nearly so interesting as a packet of yellow
letters tied with faded red tape. Mr. Ryder made no difficulty in
entrusting these to him, and we read them by our midnight lamp.

Clarence had seen poor Margaret's will, bequeathing her entire
property to her husband's son, Philip Winslow, and had noted the
date, 1705; also the copy of the decision in the Court of Probate
that there was no sufficient evidence of entail on the Fordyce
family to bar her power of disposing of it. We eagerly opened the
letters, but found them disappointing, as they were mostly offerings
of 'Felicitations' to Philip Winslow on having established his 'Just
Claim,' and 'refuted the malicious Accusations of Calumny.' They
only served to prove the fact that he had been accused of something,
and likewise that he had powerful friends, and was thought worth
being treated with adulation, according to the fashion of his day.
Perhaps it was hardly to be expected that he should have preserved
evidence against himself, but it was baffling to sift so little out
of such a mass of correspondence. If we could have had access to
the Fordyce papers, no doubt they would have given the other phase
of the transaction, but they were unattainable. The only public