Transcribed from the 1896 Smith, Elder and Co. “Lizzie Leighand Other Tales” edition , email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk.
In the county town of a certain shire there lived (about forty yearsago) one Mr. Wilkins, a conveyancing attorney of considerable standing.
The certain shire was but a small county, and the principal townin it contained only about four thousand inhabitants; so in saying thatMr. Wilkins was the principal lawyer in Hamley, I say very little, unlessI add that he transacted all the legal business of the gentry for twentymiles round. His grandfather had established the connection; hisfather had consolidated and strengthened it, and, indeed, by his wiseand upright conduct, as well as by his professional skill, had obtainedfor himself the position of confidential friend to many of the surroundingfamilies of distinction. He visited among them in a way whichno mere lawyer had ever done before; dined at their tables—healone, not accompanied by his wife, be it observed; rode to the meetoccasionally as if by accident, although he was as well mounted as anysquire among them, and was often persuaded (after a little coquettingabout “professional engagements,” and “being wantedat the office”) to have a run with his clients; nay, once or twicehe forgot his usual caution, was first in at the death, and rode homewith the brush. But in general he knew his place; as his placewas held to be in that aristocratic county, and in those days. Nor let be supposed that he was in any way a toadeater. He respectedhimself too much for that. He would give the most unpalatableadvice, if need were; would counsel an unsparing reduction of expenditureto an extravagant man; would recommend such an abatement of family prideas paved the way for one or two happy marriages in some instances; nay,what was the most likely piece of conduct of all to give offence fortyyears ago, he would speak up for an unjustly-used tenant; and that withso much temperate and well-timed wisdom and good feeling, that he morethan once gained his point. He had one son, Edward. Thisboy was the secret joy and pride of his father’s heart. For himself he was not in the least ambitious, but it did cost him ahard struggle to acknowledge that his own business was too lucrative,and brought in too large an income, to pass away into the hands of astranger, as it would do if he indulged his ambition for his son bygiving him a college education and making him into a barrister. This determination on the more prudent side of the argument took placewhile Edward was at Eton. The lad had, perhaps, the largest allowanceof pocket-money of any boy at school; and he had always looked forwardto going to Christ Church along with his fellows, the sons of the squires,his father’s employers. It was a severe mortification tohim to find that his destiny was changed, and that he had to returnto Hamley to be articled to his father, and to assume the hereditarysubservient position to lads whom he had licked in the play-ground,and beaten at learning.
His father tried to compensate him for the disappointment by everyindulgence which money could purchase. Edward’s horses wereeven finer than those of his father; his literary tastes were kept upand fostered, by his father’s permission to form an extensivelibrary, for which purpose a noble room was added to Mr. Wilkins’salready extensive house in the suburbs of Hamley. And after hisyear of legal study in London his father sent him to make the grandtour, with something very like carte blanche as to expenditure, to judgefrom the packages which were sent home from various parts of the Continent.
At last he came home—came back to settle as his father’spartner at Hamley. He was a son to be proud of,