you don't 'part,' they'll do it
quite."

The book-maker turned livid,--I never saw a man in such a funk in my
life,--and produced a greasy pocket-book, out of which he took Richard's
bank-note, and ten quite new ones; and I noticed there were more left,
so that poverty was not his excuse for fraud.

"Let me look at 'em against the sun," said the farmer, "to see as the
water-mark is all right."

This was a precaution I should never have thought of, and it gave me
for the first time a sense of the great intelligence of my father's
parishioner.

"Yes, they're all correct. And now you may go; but if ever you show your
face again on Southick (Southwick) race-course it will be the worst for
you."

He slunk away, and we returned to Richard, who was sitting on the
ground, looking at his nose, which was bleeding and had attained vast
dimensions.

"Did you get the money?" were his first words, which I thought very
characteristic.

"Yes, there it is, squire--ten fivers and your own note."

"Very good; I should never have seen a shilling of it but for you and
Charley, so we will just divide it into three shares."

The farmer said, "No," but eventually took his L16 13s. 4d., and quite
right too. Of course I did not take Richard's money, but he afterward
bought me a rifle with it, which I could not refuse. The farmer, as may
be well imagined, could be trusted to say nothing of our adventure; but
it was impossible to hide Richard's nose. He was far too honest a fellow
to tell a lie about it, and the whole story came out. His father was
dreadfully shocked at it, and Lady Jane in despair: the one about his
gambling propensities, and the other about his nose; she thought, if the
injury did not prove fatal, he would be disfigured for life.

He was well in a week, but the circumstances had the gravest
consequences. It was decided that something must be done with the heir
of the Luscombes to wean him from low company (this was not me, but
grooms and racing people); but even this predilection was ascribed in
part to his fragile constitution. A fashionable physician came down from
London to consider the case. He could not quite be brought to the point
desired by Lady Jane, to lay Richard's love of gambling at the door of
the delicacy of his lungs; but he was brought very near it. The young
fellow, his "opinion" was, had been brought up too much like a hothouse
flower; his tastes were what they were chiefly because he had no
opp