More than six and thirty years have passed since Mr. Trevor, the present proprietor of Montrevor, had taken to himself a wife, young, lovely, of good family, and endowed with much excellence, both of mind and disposition.

Miss Mainwaring had consented, in obedience to her parents' wishes, to bestow her hand upon this rich and handsome suitor, death having deprived her of the first object of her young affections.

Of a gentle and confiding disposition, she had not doubted but that one so pleasing and gentlemanly in his manners and demeanour in society, so assiduous and devoted in his attentions during courtship, would prove an amiable, affectionate husband; and that in resigning her future destiny into his hands, she was securing to herself that calm happiness to which, (the first bright dreams of youth mellowed and subdued), she alone aspired.

Her trust was deceived—her hopes disappointed; too soon was it revealed to her sick heart that Henry Trevor, the courteous and agreeable member of society, was not the same Henry Trevor of domestic life; that Henry Trevor the lover, was a very different person to Henry Trevor the husband; that she had been wedded—for her beauty?—no; woman's natural vanity might have forgiven that:—for her fortune? no; that was comparatively insignificant to count much, even in the close calculations of him, into whose well-stored coffers it was carelessly flung:—for her gentle virtues, her superior qualities of mind?—no,—no abstract love of these had had their part in her lover's choice; but because in the submissive spirit—in the mild and gentle character of her he saw as one

he had thought to find a fitting subject for his purpose and his will—one easy to be bent, moulded, crushed, if it were necessary, into the slave and minister of his favourite lust—his ruling passion—his besetting sin—the grasping, covetous, all-devouring love of money!

Scared and dismayed at the prospect opened, like some dark gulf so suddenly before her eyes, Mrs. Trevor yielded nevertheless, not without an effort, to the fate into which she had been betrayed. She had that within her, a degree of sense and spirit, which moved her in her early marriage days to use the gentle influence she hoped in some degree to have obtained over her husband's affections; to effect some change in the general system of affairs she saw daily growing up around her, as well as to assert and maintain her own gentle dignity and comparative independence as a woman and a wife.

Alas! she knew not the nature of the being with whom she had to cope; it was but as the falcon-hunted dove, fluttering within the fowler's snare, or beneath the vulture's claw, the cords are but the tighter drawn—the grasp more crushingly extended, till the victim feeling his impotence to resist, resigns itself powerless to its fate. Mrs. Trevor struggled no more. All thought of influence was at an end, except indeed that which her gentle virtues, her submissive tears, like the droppings of water upon a stone, might in time be permitted to effect.

Her wounded affections withdrew into the still sanctuary of her own mind, whilst in patient meekness she performed her duties as a wife. This was all Mr. Trevor required. He had gained his point; he had bent her to his will. She superintended and accommodated herself to the close and grinding economy he exacted in his house. She sacrificed all extravagant tastes, all expensive inclinations, bestowed charity and kindness alone from the resources of her own scanty, grudgingly-accorded allowance. Even in her less responsible requirements she gave him full satisfaction.

Mrs. Trevor bore to her husband just three sons—healthy, promising boys—none of those superfluous, money-frittering excrescences—daughters! These sons all were disposable, convertible to some aim or end. There was the heir—that necessary machine to keep the greedily-preserved fortune and property in future train; there was a second son to secure the good fat family living from escaping into extraneous hands, and there was yet another to place in the lucrative and distinguished banking-house, in which Mr. Trevor was a sleeping partner. Yes, in this she had done well and wisely, and the husband was in the end content. But in the first instance, even here, he was not entirely satisfied with his wife's conduct. Nature had rebelled against the young mother's affording nourishment to her eldest born. Other aid was required, and this unwarrantable and unnecessary infraction upon the rules and exactions of maternity, sank the parent considerably in her lord and master's valuation and esteem. The second time she proved more successful—oh, how fully successful, if to that success were to be attributed not only the pure health, the more refined vigour of body which distinguished the mother's own nursling above his eldest brother, the suckling of a farmer's burly daughter; but that nobler nature, those high-toned qualities of mind and disposition, which grew with his growth and strengthened with his years—and oh, how too successful if from that mother's breast he imbibed his own sad heritage of suffering and of wrong!

On the third, and last occasion, which presented itself, the face of affairs assumed a different aspect. Mr. Trevor, either because he grudged his wife as would not have been at all inconsistent with his character, the extreme pleasure she experienced in the former case, and the excessive fondness with which this child had naturally wound itself around its nursing mother's heart. Whether from these, or still more unworthy notices, this time Mr. Trevor, on some capricious arbitrary plea, objected to his wife indulging in the same natural enjoyment, himself selecting the individual, who was to supplant her in this office. The wife of a tenant on his estate, about to emigrate to Australia, but who preferred remaining behind for some years in service.

Mabel Marryott fulfilled her hired duties well by her patron's infant; so well, that according to her master's orders, she was afterwards retained, as general superintendant of the nursery establishment, though her influence did not long continue limited to that office; and it was Mabel Marryott, whose daily business it soon became, to attend upon the little Eugene in his morning visits to his father's study; where sometimes, for an hour together, upon table or floor, as accorded best with his age, or fancy, he sat and played the mimic miser, with his favourite toys—the shining heaps of glittering gold or silver, always produced on these occasions, to amuse and keep him quiet; whilst in that distant room above, where we have seen the unconscious Mary spend so happy an hour, sat the wife and mother, struggling with the inward anguish of an injured, wounded spirit, or straining the little Eustace to her heart, calling him, in deep, earnest accents of endearment, her darling—her own boy—her precious nursling; beseeching him never to forsake her, to stand by his own mother—to love, and to protect her, till the boy's dark, fervent eyes, would suffuse with tears, and he would promise, with the little full and throbbing heart beating against her breast, always to be "mamma's own boy," and never to leave her even when he was a man; and the heir—he, in the meantime, had probably made his escape to the stable-yard, to the grooms and stable-boys, for whose society he, from his earliest days, shewed much inclination, to the danger both of his neck and his morals, by the lessons in horse-riding or loose talking he there received—tastes and propensities with which his mother found herself powerless to interfere. Mrs. Marryott did not object. Master Trevor was neither a manageable or engaging child; these tastes and habits took him off her hands; Mr. Trevor saw only that they made the boy bold and healthy. They were propensities and amusements which cost him nothing; so he desired that he might not be pestered any more by the representations of his anxious mother; she might make one milksop if she wished, but leave the other alone; Marryott would see he came to no real harm.

The boy was to go to Eton when he was twelve. He might, his father continued, be allowed to take his own course till then; and Mrs. Trevor, though not suffered to interfere in any other department, was expected to take upon herself the arduous office of instructress to this one, as well as to her other two boys, who were also to be kept at home till they had attained the before-mentioned age.

Mr. Trevor had no idea of his wife's talents being put to no better purpose than the solace and amusement of her own lonely, joyless existence; and the poor lady was too willing to enter on a task, which promised a means of drawing her children towards her in closer intercourse than was otherwise permitted. Such was the cruel jealousy, which dared to prevent the mother from acquiring too great an influence and ascendancy over the children's affections.

Long, however, before the time assigned, Mrs. Trevor was forced to represent to the father her insufficiency and unfitness for the duty imposed upon her.

The thick-headed, mulish-tempered Henry, his heart and mind ever with his dogs and horses, very soon began to require some stronger hand and firmer will than she possessed to force him into any degree of application; whilst the two other boys, the one high-spirited and talented in the extreme—the younger taught to look upon his mother in little better light than that of a slighted and despised dependant—became even earlier, above or beyond her strength and power for the work.

But in vain might she remonstrate.

"You are idle, you are idle," was all the answer or relief she obtained.

So she began again, and persevered—much to the wear and tear of body and nerves. But that was nothing. It was an employment—and should have been an interest and amusement rather than an hardship.

And so the mother laboured on with all a mother's patience and long-suffering, bearing rather than contending against the many difficulties and discouragements which beset the task.

One rich reward was its attendant—the satisfactory fruit which crowned her efforts, however comparatively weak and inefficient they might be, as concerned her noble son, Eustace; not but that pain and trouble of a certain kind were her portion, even here. But it was a pleasureable pain, how exceeded by the ample recompense it afforded.

What fervent gratitude—what deep, strong affection did every tear she shed, every sigh she breathed in his cause, fan into life, water into vigour in that young pupil's breast! How was she adored, revered, upheld supreme at least in the heart of one being in the world.

Eustace Trevor, as those of generous and superior natures generally are found to be, was a child of naturally impetuous disposition and independent spirit. Though full of genius, and promise of bright things to come, it could not be but that he sometimes grieved his gentle teacher, and gave her patient spirit pain.

But ah, the contrite grief; the self-indignant sorrow of the child which ever followed on such occasions; how was he prostrate in body and spirit before the beloved being, whom he had so offended. How the elder brother dull, and unrefined in feeling, rather than unamiable at heart, would stare with stupid amazement at such animated demonstrations in the penitent; whilst the younger—what a glance of cold surprise from his dark eye—what a look almost of disdain in his young countenance, as he sat, and watched, and wondered to see such affection—such zeal displayed in the cause of one he was used to behold, so scorned, so slighted so dishonoured, by those who had gained ascendancy over his young mind.

It was worth while to love his father—to seek to please and propitiate him—or even Mabel Marryott. But she! what could she do? what influence, did she possess over her children, or any one else either for good or evil?

Yet the boy Eugene was by no means an unaffectionate or unengaging child, nor devoid of amiability of character; had it not been for the early influences which impressed, and moulded his mind and disposition.

His father and Mabel Marryott both loved him in their way; the former suffering him to win a greater ascendancy over his close shut heart, than that which any other individual ever attained. Nay, to him he even relaxed in some degree his strongest, and most guarded point of impregnability—his purse strings.

When his elder brothers as children, obtained their grudgingly acceded shillings and sixpences, the more valuable crown piece, or sometimes half-sovereign was bestowed upon the favoured Eugene—to be triumphantly produced at the neighbouring town, where he occasionally rode with his brother Eustace, for the gratification of any taste or appetite, in which he might choose to indulge; whilst the other expended his scanty store on some trifling gift he thought might gratify, or please his much loved mother. Yes, this was the most galling of all poor Mrs. Trevor's catalogue of grievances—the unjust and cruel partiality exhibited by her husband in the treatment of these two younger boys; for the eldest, Henry, though neither favoured or in any way much regarded by his father, at any rate met with neither injustice or unkindness—inasmuch as neither his nature or propensities, rendered him worthy or desirous of any greater degree of privilege or advantage, than he obtained—and he was sent to Eton at thirteen, when all that was to be done for him was done, that was necessary and proper. But the second son, Eustace—whether it was the boy's disposition, so antagonistic in every respect to his father's; or that it was her own unfortunate attachment to this child, or that child's love for herself which drew upon his innocent head this unhappy distinction; whether it was this cruel jealousy on her husband's part, or the secret influence on the same, account, of her insidious enemy, Mabel Marryott. However it might be, a spirit and system, it might almost be termed persecution, was maintained by the father towards this son from his childhood upwards. He felt doubtless too the reflection, which the zealous love of the boy for his mother cast upon his own conduct in that respect. Never did Mr. Trevor forgive a proof of this spirit, shown forth by the young Eustace in the instance we are about to record.