poor be raised above "their station"? What right
have we to keep them down? How long have they been our born thralls
in soul, as well as in body? What right have we to say that they
shall know no higher recreation than the hogs, because, forsooth, if
we raised them, they might refuse to work--FOR US? Are WE to fix
how far their minds may be developed? Has not God fixed it for us,
when He gave them the same passions, talents, tastes, as our own?'

Tregarva's meditations must have been running in a very different
channel, for he suddenly burst out, after a long silence--

'It's a pity these fairs can't be put down. They do a lot of harm;
ruin all the young girls round, the Dissenters' children especially,
for they run utterly wild; their parents have no hold on them at
all.'

'They tell them that they are children of the devil,' said Lancelot.
'What wonder if the children take them at their word, and act
accordingly?'

'The parson here, sir, who is a God-fearing man enough, tried hard
to put down this one, but the innkeepers were too strong for him.'

'To take away their only amusement, in short. He had much better
have set to work to amuse them himself.'

'His business is to save souls, sir, and not to amuse them. I don't
see, sir, what Christian people want with such vanities.'

Lancelot did not argue the point, for he knew the prejudices of
Dissenters on the subject; but it did strike him that if Tregarva's
brain had been a little less preponderant, he, too, might have found
the need of some recreation besides books and thought.

By this time they were at Lancelot's door. He bid the keeper a
hearty good-night, made him promise to see him next day, and went to
bed and slept till nearly noon.

When he walked into his breakfast-room, he found a note on the table
in his uncle's handwriting. The vicar's servant had left it an hour
before. He opened it listlessly, rang the bell furiously, ordered
out his best horse, and, huddling on his clothes, galloped to the
nearest station, caught the train, and arrived at his uncle's bank--
it had stopped payment two hours before.

CHAPTER XIV: WHAT'S TO BE DONE?

Yes! the bank had stopped. The ancient firm of Smith, Brown, Jones,
Robinson, and Co., which had been for some years past expanding from
a solid golden organism into a cobweb-tissue and huge balloon of
threadbare paper, had at last worn through and collapsed, droppi