IN THREE VOLUMES. Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And never brought to mind? VOL. I. LONDON: PRINTED FOR T. CADELL, STRAND, AND W. BLACKWOOD, EDINBURGH. M. DCCC. XXV. AMBITION. CHAPTER I. THE FIRE. Home keeping youths have, ever, homely wits, Two Gentlemen of Verona. Striving to better, oft, we mar what's well. Macbeth. IT was on a dark evening in the latter end of the year eighteen hundred and odd, when London was involved in one of those mists which frequently occur in the city and its environs, that a post-chaise drove up to the door of an hotel in Holborn, and three persons stepped out of it, whom the waiter ushered into a front VOL. I. B 12 parlour, where the blaze of a brilliant fire threw warmth and cheerfulness over the scene. The first that we shall introduce to the notice of our readers, is the Earl of Castle Gwynne, returning from the grand tour; the others are his tutor, and French valet. Lord Gwynne-Arthur, heir to one of the finest estates in Wales, was now proceeding to Castle Gwynne, a noble mansion situated in the hilly district of a southern county, to take possession of his patrimonial property, and celebrate his coming of age; an event which had occurred some months previously, whilst his Lordship was on the Continent, but the rejoicings on that festive occasion had been deferred until the Christmas holidays, when, being returned from his foreign tour, the 4 presence of an object so dearly and generally beloved would add to the happiness and vivacity of the scene. 3 The pressing entreaties of his mother, the Countess of Castle Gwynne, had induced him to journey with all possible speed from Paris, but having some business to transact in London, |