l six years. There were a few offenders,
they say, who were brought up and admonished, and let go; but even that
did not happen down here, and need not happen now, unless you put my son
here (for you shall never put me, I warrant you) upon some deed which
had better be left alone, and so bring us all to shame."

"Your son, sir, if not openly vowed to God, has, I hope, a due sense
of that inward vocation which we have seen in him, and reverences his
spiritual fathers too well to listen to the temptations of his earthly
father."

"What, sir, will you teach my son to disobey me?"

"Your son is ours also, sir. This is strange language in one who owes a
debt to the Church, which it was charitably fancied he meant to pay in
the person of his child."

These last words touched poor Mr. Leigh in a sore point, and breaking
all bounds, he swore roundly at Parsons, who stood foaming with rage.

"A plague upon you, sir, and a black assizes for you, for you will come
to the gallows yet! Do you mean to taunt me in my own house with that
Hartland land? You had better go back and ask those who sent you where
the dispensation to hold the land is, which they promised to get me
years ago, and have gone on putting me off, till they have got my money,
and my son, and my conscience, and I vow before all the saints, seem now
to want my head over and above. God help me!"--and the poor man's eyes
fairly filled with tears.

Now was Eustace's turn to be roused; for, after all, he was an
Englishman and a gentleman; and he said kindly enough, but firmly--

"Courage, my dearest father. Remember that I am still your son, and not
a Jesuit yet; and whether I ever become one, I promise you, will depend
mainly on the treatment which you meet with at the hands of these
reverend gentlemen, for whom I, as having brought them hither, must
consider myself as surety to you."

If a powder-barrel had exploded in the Jesuits' faces, they could not
have been more amazed. Campian looked blank at Parsons, and Parsons at
Campian; till the stouter-hearted of the two, recovering his breath at
last--

"Sir! do you know, sir, the curse pronounced on those who, after putting
their hand to the plough, look back?"

Eustace was one of those impulsive men, with a lack of moral courage,
who dare raise the devil, but never dare fight him after he has been
raised; and he now tried to pass off his speech by winking and making
signs in the direction of his father, as mu