le sun-traps, with a low sloped roofing of
grey-green slate to them, set fan-wise.

Such was the house at Deadham Hard when Mr. Verity's labours were
completed. And such did it remain until a good eighty years later, when
it was visited by a youthful namesake and great-great nephew, under
circumstances not altogether unworthy of record.

CHAPTER II

ENTER A YOUNG SCHOLAR AND GENTLEMAN OF A HAPPY DISPOSITION AND
GOOD PROSPECTS

The four-twenty down train rumbled into Marychurch station, and Tom
Verity stepped out of a rather frousty first-class carriage on to the
platform. There hot still September sunshine, tempered by a freshness off
the sea, met him. The effect was pleasurable, adding delicate zest to the
enjoyment of living which already possessed him. Coming from inland, the
near neighbourhood of the sea, the sea with its eternal invitation,
stirred his blood.

For was not he about to accept the said invitation in its fullest and
most practical expression? Witness the fact that, earlier in the day, he
had deposited his heavy baggage at that house of many partings, many
meetings, Radley's Hotel, Southampton; and journeyed on to Marychurch
with a solitary, eminently virgin, cowhide portmanteau, upon the
yellow-brown surface of which the words--"Thomas Clarkson Verity,
passenger Bombay, first cabin R.M.S. _Penang_"--were inscribed in the
whitest of lettering. His name stood high in the list of successful
candidates at the last Indian Civil Service examination. Now he reaped
the reward of past endeavour. For with that deposition of heavy baggage
at Radley's the last farewell to years of tutelage seemed to him to be
spoken. Nursery discipline, the restraints and prohibitions--in their
respective degrees--of preparatory school, of Harchester, of Oxford; and,
above all and through all, the control and admonitions of his father, the
Archdeacon, fell away from him into the limbo of things done with,
outworn and outpaced.

This moved him as pathetic, yet as satisfactory also, since it set him
free to fix his mind, without lurking suspicion of indecorum, upon the
large promise of the future. He could give rein to his eagerness, to his
high sense of expectation, while remaining innocent of impiety towards
persons and places holding, until now, first claim on his obedience and
affection. All this fell in admirably with his natural bent.
Self-reliant, agreeably egotistical, convinced of the excellence of his
socia