at last genteelly finished himself, by which this remaining brother got to be head of the firm: and so you see, Viney, one good turn deserves another.'
'True, true,' said Viney.

So said, so done. Standfast left a friend to officiate for him at Little Hockley, and repaired to town, where he so well set his engines to work, that, in six months, he not only got introduced to Lord Hazard, but contrived so to sustain the several essays made on his disposition and abilities, that he issued from that ordeal through which the reader may remember my lord was determined his son's tutor should pass so perfect, as to fix himself securely in that nobleman's good opinion; and indeed—which I should not think it necessary to set down, but by way of regularity—Mr. Standfast was the very gentleman introduced to Lady Hazard in the fourth chapter of the first book, in quality of tutor to her son.
If the reader should wonder how it came to pass that Lord Hazard did not know the irregularities of Standfast, especially as one was curate of Little Hockley, and the other landlord, I must inform him that his lordship had never visited his estate in Warwickshire but once after his second marriage,

but repaired to a villa about twenty miles from London, which he bought soon after he came of age. Indeed, as soon as he determined to give over his excesses, Little Hockley was the last place upon earth he wished to think of. His rents were punctually remitted, and this was all he ever would hear upon the subject.
Neither his reformation, however, nor this caution altered his character in the opinion of the villagers; for as the sons and daughters of Little Hockley were many of them of his getting, and the rest very ambitious to be thought so, they never dreamt that he had any virtues, but remembered his vices only, glorying in them, and speaking of them in so familiar and shameless a manner, as if every meal they tasted was the sweeter for being garnished with the bread of dishonour.
I will not suppose my reader to be so inexperienced as to think that Standfast's views were merely confined to his intention of becoming the tutor of Charles; nor, on the other hand, will I believe him so sagacious as to discover what they really were.—We can scarcely credit that a man of this worthy clergyman's consummate experience in human traffic had not a material point to carry, especially now

he was in partnership with Viney. If it was so it will certainly come