er, 1705--leaving an only son, hardly twelve
years old, called by the strange but significant name of Ultor.

At this point commences the marvellous ingredient of my tale.

When his father was dying, he had him to his bedside, with no one by
except his confessor; and having told him, first, that on reaching the
age of twenty-one, he was to lay claim to a certain small estate in the
county of Clare, in Ireland, in right of his mother--the title-deeds of
which he gave him--and next, having enjoined him not to marry before the
age of thirty, on the ground that earlier marriages destroyed the spirit
and the power of enterprise, and would incapacitate him from the
accomplishment of his destiny--the restoration of his family--he then
went on to open to the child a matter which so terrified him that he
cried lamentably, trembling all over, clinging to the priest's gown with
one hand and to his father's cold wrist with the other, and imploring
him, with screams of horror, to desist from his communication.

But the priest, impressed, no doubt, himself, with its necessity,
compelled him to listen. And then his father showed him a small picture,
from which also the child turned with shrieks, until similarly
constrained to look. They did not let him go until he had carefully
conned the features, and was able to tell them, from memory, the colour
of the eyes and hair, and the fashion and hues of the dress. Then his
father gave him a black box containing this portrait, which was a
full-length miniature, about nine inches long, painted very finely in
oils, as smooth as enamel, and folded above it a sheet of paper, written
over in a careful and very legible hand.

The deeds and this black box constituted the most important legacy
bequeathed to his only child by the ruined Jacobite, and he deposited
them in the hands of the priest, in trust, till his boy, Ultor, should
have attained to an age to understand their value, and to keep them
securely.

When this scene was ended, the dying exile's mind, I suppose, was
relieved, for he spoke cheerily, and said he believed he would recover;
and they soothed the crying child, and his father kissed him, and gave
him a little silver coin to buy fruit with; and so they sent him off
with another boy for a walk, and when he came back his father was dead.

He remained in France under the care of this ecclesiastic until he had
attained the age of twenty-one, when he repaired to Ireland, and his
ti