It is not to be supposed that such an encounter as Mr. Preston had just had with Roger Hamley sweetened the regards in which the two young men henceforward held each other. They had barely spoken to each other before, and but seldom met; for the land-agent’s employment had hitherto lain at Ashcombe, some sixteen or seventeen miles from Hamley. He was older than Roger by several years; but during the time he had been in the county Osborne and Roger had been at school and at college. Mr. Preston was prepared to dislike the Hamleys for many unreasonable² reasons. Cynthia and Molly had both spoken of the brothers with familiar regard, implying considerable intimacy³; their flowers had been preferred to his on the occasion of the ball; most people spoke¹ well of them; and Mr. Preston had an animal’s instinctive⁴ jealousy⁵ and combativeness⁶ against all popular young men. Their ‘position’— poor as the Hamleys might be-was far higher than his own in the county; and, moreover, he was agent to the great Whig lord, whose political interests were diametrically opposed to those of the old Tory squire⁷. Not that Lord Cumnor troubled himself much about his political interests. His family had obtained property and title from the Whigs at the time of the Hanoverian succession; and so, traditionally, he was a Whig, and had belonged in his youth to Whig clubs, where he had lost considerable sums of money to Whig gamblers. All this was satisfactory and consistent enough. And if Lord Hollingford had not been returned for the county on the Whig interest — as his father had been before him, until he had succeeded to the title — it is quite probable Lord Cumnor would have considered the British constitution in danger, and the patriotism⁸ of his ancestors ungratefully ignored. But, excepting at elections, he had no notion of making Whig and Tory a party cry. He had lived too much in London, and was of too

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