hrase that
has become almost synonymous with rascality,--a regular
church-goer,--accounts kept with scrupulous exactness,--a man of honest
face, distinguished for probity of speech and integrity of heart,--what
could the Trevannions do? What more than the Smiths and the Browns and
the Joneses, who, notwithstanding their presumed greater skill in the
ways of a wicked lawyer world, are duped every day in a similar manner.
It is an old and oft-repeated story,--a tale too often told, and too
often true,--that of the family lawyer and his confiding client,
standing in the relationship of robber and robbed.

The two children of Squire Trevannion could do nothing to save or
recover their paternal estate. Caught in the net of legal chicanery,
they were forced to yield, as other squire's children have had to do,
and make the best of a bad matter,--forced to depart from a home that
had been held by Trevannions perhaps since the Phoenicians strayed
thitherward in search of their shining tin.

It sore grieved them to separate from the scenes of their youth; but the
secret understanding with the solicitor required that sacrifice. By
staying at home a still greater might be called for,--subsistence in
penury, and, worse than all, in a humiliating position; for,
notwithstanding the open house long kept by their father, his friends
had disappeared with his guests. Impelled by these thoughts, the
brothers resolved to go forth into the wide world, and seek fortune
wherever it seemed most likely they should find it.

They were at this period something more than mere children. Ralph had
reached within twelve months of being twenty. Richard was his junior by
a couple of years. Their book-education had been good; the practice of
manly sports had imparted to both of them a physical strength that
fitted them for toil, either of the mind or body. They were equal to a
tough struggle, either in the intellectual or material world; and to
this they determined to resign themselves.

For a time they debated between themselves where they should go, and
what do. The army and navy came under their consideration. With such
patronage as their father's former friends could command, and might
still exert in favor of their fallen fortunes, a commission in either
army or navy was not above their ambition. But neither felt much
inclined towards a naval or military life; the truth being, that a
thought had taken shape in their minds leading them to a differ