 accounts of his employment at Queen's Crawley were not
caricatures. He subjected the servants there to the devotional exercises before
mentioned, in which (and so much the better) he brought his father to join. He
patronized an Independent meeting-house in Crawley parish, much to the
indignation of his uncle the Rector, and to the consequent delight of Sir Pitt,
who was induced to go himself once or twice, which occasioned some violent
sermons at Crawley parish church, directed point-blank at the Baronet's old
Gothic pew there. Honest Sir Pitt, however, did not feel the force of these
discourses, as he always took his nap during sermon-time.
    Mr. Crawley was very earnest, for the good of the nation and of the
Christian world, that the old gentleman should yield him up his place in
Parliament; but this the elder constantly refused to do. Both were, of course,
too prudent to give up the fifteen hundred a year which was brought in by the
second seat (at this period filled by Mr. Quadroon, with carte-blanche on the
Slave question); indeed the family estate was much embarrassed, and the income
drawn from the borough was of great use to the house of Queen's Crawley.
    It had never recovered the heavy fine imposed upon Walpole Crawley, first
baronet, for peculation in the Tape and Sealing-Wax Office. Sir Walpole was a
jolly fellow, eager to seize and to spend money (»alieni appetens, sui
profusus,« as Mr. Crawley would remark with a sigh), and in his day be- loved by
all the county for the constant drunkenness and hospitality which was maintained
at Queen's Crawley. The cellars were filled with Burgundy then, the kennels with
hounds, and the stables with gallant hunters; now, such horses as Queen's
Crawley possessed went to plough, or ran in the Trafalgar Coach: and it was with
a team of these very horses, on an off-day, that Miss Sharp was brought to the
Hall; for boor as he was, Sir Pitt was a stickler for his dignity while at home,
and seldom drove out but with four horses, and, though he dined off boiled
mutton, had always three footmen to serve it.
    If mere parsimony could have made a man rich, Sir Pitt Crawley might have
become very wealthy; if he had been an attorney in a country town, with no
capital but his brains, it is very possible that he would have turned them to
good account, and might have achieved for himself a very
