"Be patient, patient still, my dear sister," whispered Randal, "and keep
your heart whole for two years longer." The young man was gay and good-
humoured over his simple meal, while his family grouped round him. When
it was over, Mr. Leslie lighted his pipe, and called for his brandy-and-
water. Mrs. Leslie began to question about London and Court, and the new
king and the new queen, and Mr. Audley Egerton, and hoped Mr. Egerton
would leave Randal all his money, and that Randal would marry a rich
woman, and that the king would make him a prime minister one of these
days; and then she should like to see if Farmer Jones would refuse to
send his wagon for coals! And every now and then, as the word "riches"
or "money" caught Mr. Leslie's ears, he shook his head, drew his pipe
from his mouth, "A Spratt should not have what belonged to my great-
great-grandfather. If I had a good sum of ready money! the old family
estates!" Oliver and Juliet sat silent, and on their good behaviour; and
Randal, indulging his own reveries, dreamily heard the words "money,"
"Spratt," "great-great-grandfather," "rich wife," "family estates;" and
they sounded to him vague and afar off, like whispers from the world of
romance and legend,--weird prophecies of things to be.

Such was the hearth which warmed the viper that nestled and gnawed at the
heart of Randal, poisoning all the aspirations that youth should have
rendered pure, ambition lofty, and knowledge beneficent and divine.




CHAPTER VI.

When the rest of the household were in deep sleep, Randal stood long at
his open window, looking over the dreary, comfortless scene,--the moon