by no means so certain as paternal affection would
have desired, that the same overpowering influence would not cause in the sequel
the penal clause to be executed in all its strictness.
    This was the finishing stroke to Hawkins's miseries. As he was not deficient
in courage, he had stood up against his other persecutions without flinching. He
was not unaware of the advantages which our laws and customs give to the rich
over the poor in contentions of this kind. But, being once involved, there was a
stubbornness in his nature that would not allow him to retract, and he suffered
himself to hope rather than expect a favourable issue. But in this last event he
was wounded in the point that was nearest his heart. He had feared to have his
son contaminated and debased by a servile station, and he now saw him
transferred to the seminary of a jail. He was even uncertain as to the issue of
his imprisonment, and trembled to think what the tyranny of wealth might effect
to blast his hopes for ever.
    From this moment his heart died within him. He had trusted to persevering
industry and skill to save the wreck of his little property from the vulgar
spite of his landlord. But he had now no longer any spirit to exert those
efforts which his situation more than ever required. Mr. Tyrrel proceeded
without remission in his machinations; Hawkins's affairs every day grew more
desperate; and the squire, watching the occasion, took the earliest opportunity
of seizing upon his remaining property in the mode of a distress for rent.
    It was precisely in this stage of the affair that Mr. Falkland and Mr.
Tyrrel accidentally met in a private road near the habitation of the latter.
They were on horseback, and Mr. Falkland was going to the house of the
unfortunate tenant who seemed upon the point of perishing under his landlord's
malice. He had been just made acquainted with the tale of this persecution. It
had indeed been an additional aggravation of Hawkins's calamity that Mr.
Falkland, whose interference might otherwise have saved him, had been absent
from the neighbourhood for a considerable time. He had been three months in
London, and from thence had gone to visit his estates in another part of the
island. The proud and self-confident spirit of this poor fellow always disposed
him to depend as long as possible upon his own exertions. He had avoided
applying to Mr. Falkland, or indeed indulging himself in any manner in
communicating and bewailing his hard hap, in the beginning of the contention;
and, when the extremity grew more urgent, and he