UPON the fourth day after the reception of her Paris letter, my Lady had to leave Mirk for town on business connected with Walter's affairs-for, after all, she cannot permit his elder brother to bear the whole brunt of these unexpected expenses. Her visit was to the family lawyer, and she went alone save for the attendance of Mistress Forest. Under any circumstances, she would rather it were thus, she repeats, even if the preparations going on at Mirk did not take up so fully Sir Richard's time, and render his accompanying her out of the question. For this Coming of Age was a case wherein surely a man might busy himself even though the whole affair was to be held in his own honour; the very name of Lisgard being in a manner at stake, and obnoxious to censure, if everything should not be in a fitting scale and perfect of its kind; nay (though certainly more remotely), might not the Great Principle of Territorial Aristocracy have been almost said to be upon its trial upon the coming occasion? The business must have been pressing indeed, remarked the baronet a little pointedly, that took the mistress of Mirk from home at such an important epoch; and he thought in his heart that his mother might have put off this signature of a few parchments until after the fete-day."