n
promising to appoint me your agent. You may rest assured, my Lord, that
I will go through my duties as such without favor or affection to any
one, barring your lordship, whose interests it will night and day become
my duty to study. With, respect to the loan your lordship makes allusion
to, I fear it will be out of my power to raise it--that is to the full
amount; but if one-half would do, I might by the aid of friends get it
together. As for security, I trust it is only necessary to say, that
Randal Deaker and Cadwallader Tullywagger, Esqrs., are ready to give it
to any amount, so that there is no difficulty there at all events.

"On looking again at your lordship's kind letter, it appears possible
that I made a mistake in considering the two thousand as a loan; but
on the other hand, there is not a man living, who respects the high
principles and delicate feelings of our aristocracy more than I do,
and the consequence was, that I feared in supposing it otherwise than a
loan, I might offend your lordship's keen sense of honor, which I pledge
my credit and reputation would grieve my heart even to think of. Under
this impression, then, I shall continue to believe it a loan, until I
have the honor of hearing from your lordship again.

"Your anxiety, my Lord, to ascertain the state of your property and the
condition of your tenantry is certainly honorable to yourself, as being
a direct proof of the generous interest you feel in their welfare. It is
fortunate in this instance, that your lordship should apply to a man who
has had the opportunities of becoming acquainted with both. True, I am
a simple-minded man, my Lord, and if I possess one quality more
than another it is a love of truth, and a slow, but straightforward
perseverance in whatever is right. It is to this, always under
Providence, that I owe everything. I grant indeed, that it ill becomes
me to speak in this manner of myself, but my object in doing so is,
that as I am about to enter into communications touching your lordship's
tenants and property, you may be induced to place the fullest confidence
in whatever I shall say. Many a time, indeed, my excellent and worthy
friend, Mr. Hickman, has made the same observation, and I felt it
gratifying in the highest degree to hear this from a man who is truth
itself, and whose only fault is--if it be one--that his heart is too
kind, and rather easily imposed on by those who deal in fraud and
cunning. A man like him,