The first stage of the Barringtons' journey was Dublin. They alighted at Reynolds's Hotel, in Old Dominick Street, the once favorite resort of country celebrities. The house, it is true, was there, but Reynolds had long left for a land where there is but one summons and one reckoning; even the old waiter, Foster, whom people believed immortal, was gone; and save some cumbrous old pieces of furniture,—barbarous relics of bad taste in mahogany,—nothing recalled the past. The bar, where once on a time the “Beaux” and “Bloods” had gathered to exchange the smart things of the House or the hunting-field, was now a dingy little receptacle for umbrellas and overcoats, with a rickety case crammed full of unacknowledged and unclaimed letters, announcements of cattle fairs, and bills of houses to let. Decay and neglect were on everything, and the grim little waiter who ushered them upstairs seemed as much astonished at their coming as were they themselves with all they saw. It was not for some time, nor without searching inquiry, that Miss Dinah discovered that the tide of popular favor had long since retired from this quarter, and left it a mere barren strand, wreck-strewn and deserted. The house where formerly the great squire held his revels had now fallen to be the resort of the traveller by canal-boat, the cattle salesman, or the priest. While she by an ingenious cross-examination was eliciting these details, Barrington had taken a walk through the city to revisit old scenes and revive old memories. One needs not to be as old as Peter Barrington to have gone through this process and experienced all its pain. Unquestionably, every city of Europe has made within such a period as five-and-thirty or forty years immense strides of improvement. Wider and finer streets, more commodious thoroughfares, better bridges, lighter areas, more brilliant shops, strike one on every hand; while the more permanent monuments of architecture are more cleanly, more orderly, and more cared for than of old. We see these things with astonishment and admiration at first, and then there comes a pang of painful regret,—not for the old dark alley and the crooked street, or the tumbling arch of long ago,—but for the time when they were there, for the time when they entered into our daily life, when with them were associated friends long lost sight of, and scenes dimly fading away from memory. It is for our youth, for the glorious spring and elasticity of our once high-hearted spirit, of our lives so free of care, of our days undarkened by a serious sorrow,—it is for these we mourn, and to our eyes at such moments the spacious street is but a desert, and the splendid monument but a whitened sepulchre!

“I don't think I ever had a sadder walk in my life, Dinah,” said Peter Barrington, with a weary sigh. “'Till I got into the courts of the College, I never chanced upon a spot that looked as I had left it. There, indeed, was the quaint old square as of old, and the great bell—bless it for its kind voice!—was ringing out a solemn call to something, that shook the window-frames, and made the very air tremulous; and a pale-faced student or two hurried past, and those centurions in the helmets,—ancient porters or Senior Fellows,—I forget which,—stood in a little knot to stare at me. That, indeed, was like old times, Dinah, and my heart grew very full with the memory. After that I strolled down to the Four Courts. I knew you 'd laugh, Dinah. I knew well you 'd say, 'Was there nothing going on in the King's Bench or the Common Pleas?' Well, there was only a Revenue case, my dear, but it was interesting, very interesting; and there was my old friend Harry Bushe sitting as the Judge. He saw me, and sent round the tipstaff to have me come up and sit on the bench with him, and we had many a pleasant remembrance of old times—as the cross-examination went on—between us, and I promised to dine with him on Saturday.”

“And on Saturday we will dine at Antwerp, brother, if I know anything of myself.”

“Sure enough, sister, I forgot all about it Well, well, where could my head have been?”

“Pretty much where you have worn it of late years, Peter Barrington. And what of Withering? Did you see him?”

“No, Dinah, he was attending a Privy Council; but I got his address, and I mean to go over to see him after dinner.”

“Please to bear in mind that you are not to form any engagements, Peter,—we leave this to-morrow evening by the packet,—if it was the Viceroy himself that wanted your company.”

“Of course, dear, I never thought of such a thing. It was only when Harry said, 'You 'll be glad to meet Casey and Burrowes, and a few others of the old set,' I clean forgot everything of the present, and only lived in the long-past time, when life really was a very jolly thing.”

“How did you find your friend looking?”

“Old, Dinah, very old! That vile wig has, perhaps, something to say to it; and being a judge, too, gives a sternness to the mouth and a haughty imperiousness to the brow. It spoils Harry; utterly spoils that laughing blue eye, and that fine rich humor that used to play about his lips.”

“Which did, you ought to say,—which did some forty years ago. What are you laughing at, Peter? What is it amuses you so highly?”

“It was a charge of O'Grady's, that Harry told me,—a charge to one of those petty juries that, he says, never will go right, do what you may. The case was a young student of Trinity, tried for a theft, and whose defence was only by witnesses to character, and O'Grady said, 'Gentlemen of the jury, the issue before you is easy enough. This is a young gentleman of pleasing manners and the very best connections, who stole a pair of silk stockings, and you will find accordingly.' And what d'ye think, Dinah? They acquitted him, just out of compliment to the Bench.”

“I declare, brother Peter, such a story inspires any other sentiment than mirth to me.”

“I laughed at it till my sides ached,” said he, wiping his eyes. “I took a peep into the Chancery Court and saw O'Connell, who has plenty of business, they tell me. He was in some altercation with the Court. Lord Manners was scowling at him, as if he hated him. I hear that no day passes without some angry passage between them.”

“And is it of these jangling, quarrelsome, irritable, and insolent men your ideal of agreeable society is made up, brother Peter?”

“Not a doubt of it, Dinah. All these displays are briefed to them. They cannot help investing in their client's cause the fervor of their natures, simply because they are human; but they know how to leave all the acrimony of the contest in the wig-box, when they undress and come back to their homes,—the most genial, hearty, and frank fellows in all the world. If human nature were all bad, sister, he who saw it closest would be, I own, most like to catch its corruption, but it is not so, far from it. Every day and every hour reveals something to make a man right proud of his fellow-men.”

Miss Barrington curtly recalled her brother from these speculations to the practical details of their journey, reminding him of much that he had to consult Withering upon, and many questions of importance to put to him. Thoroughly impressed with the perils of a journey abroad, she conjured up a vast array of imaginary difficulties, and demanded special instructions how each of them was to be met. Had poor Peter been—what he certainly was not—a most accomplished casuist, he might have been puzzled by the ingenious complexity of some of those embarrassments. As it was, like a man in the labyrinth, too much bewildered to attempt escape, he sat down in a dogged insensibility, and actually heard nothing.

“Are you minding me, Peter?” asked she, fretfully, at last; “are you paying attention to what I am saying?”

“Of course I am, Dinah dear; I'm listening with all ears.”

“What was it, then, that I last remarked? What was the subject to which I asked your attention?”

Thus suddenly called on, poor Peter started and rubbed his forehead. Vague shadows of passport people, and custom-house folk, and waiters, and money-changers, and brigands; insolent postilions, importunate beggars, cheating innkeepers, and insinuating swindlers were passing through his head, with innumerable incidents of the road; and, trying to catch a clew at random, he said, “It was to ask the Envoy, her Majesty's Minister at Brussels, about a washerwoman who would not tear off my shirt buttons—eh, Dinah? wasn't that it?”

“You are insupportable, Peter Barrington,” said she, rising in anger. “I believe that insensibility like this is not to be paralleled!” and she left the room in wrath.

Peter looked at his watch, and was glad to see it was past eight o'clock, and about the hour he meant for his visit to Withering. He set out accordingly, not, indeed, quite satisfied with the way he had lately acquitted himself, but consoled by thinking that Dinah rarely went back of a morning on the dereliction of the evening before, so that they should meet good friends as ever at the breakfast-table. Withering was at home, but a most discreet-looking butler intimated that he had dined that day tÊte-À-tÊte with a gentleman, and had left orders not to be disturbed on any pretext “Could you not at least, send in my name?” said Barrington; “I am a very old friend of your master's, whom he would regret not having seen.” A little persuasion aided by an argument that butlers usually succumb to succeeded, and before Peter believed that his card could have reached its destination, his friend was warmly shaking him by both hands, as he hurried him into the dinner-room.

“You don't know what an opportune visit you have made me, Barrington,” said he; “but first, to present you to my friend, Captain Stapylton—or Major—which is it?”

“Captain. This day week, the 'Gazette,' perhaps, may call me Major.”

“Always a pleasure to me to meet a soldier, sir,” said Barrington; “and I own to the weakness of saying, all the greater when a Dragoon. My own boy was a cavalryman.”

“It was exactly of him we were talking,” said Withering; “my friend here has had a long experience of India, and has frankly told me much I was totally ignorant of. From one thing to another we rambled on till we came to discuss our great suit with the Company, and Captain Stapylton assures me that we have never taken the right road in the case.”

“Nay, I could hardly have had such presumption; I merely remarked, that without knowing India and its habits, you could scarcely be prepared to encounter the sort of testimony that would be opposed to you, or to benefit by what might tend greatly in your favor.”

“Just so—continue,” said Withering, who looked as though he had got an admirable witness on the table.

“I'm astonished to hear from the Attorney-General,” resumed Stapylton, “that in a case of such magnitude as this you have never thought of sending out an efficient agent to India to collect evidence, sift testimony, and make personal inquiry as to the degree of credit to be accorded to many of the witnesses. This inquisitorial process is the very first step in every Oriental suit; you start at once, in fact, by sapping all the enemy's works,—countermining him everywhere.”

“Listen, Barrington,—listen to this; it is all new to us.”

“Everything being done by documentary evidence, there is a wide field for all the subtlety of the linguist; and Hindostanee has complexities enough to gratify the most inordinate appetite for quibble. A learned scholar—a Moonshee of erudition—is, therefore, the very first requisite, great care being taken to ascertain that he is not in the pay of the enemy.”

“What rascals!” muttered Barrington.

“Very deep—very astute dogs, certainly, but perhaps not much more unprincipled than some fellows nearer home,” continued the Captain, sipping his wine; “the great peculiarity of this class is, that while employing them in the most palpably knavish manner, and obtaining from them services bought at every sacrifice of honor, they expect all the deference due to the most umblemished integrity.”

“I'd see them—I won't say where—first,” broke out Barrington; “and I 'd see my lawsuit after them, if only to be won by their intervention.”

“Remember, sir,” said Stapylton, calmly, “that such are the weapons employed against you. That great Company does not, nor can it afford to, despise such auxiliaries. The East has its customs, and the natures of men are not light things to be smoothed down by conventionalities. Were you, for instance, to measure a testimony at Calcutta by the standard of Westminster Hall, you would probably do a great and grievous injustice.”

“Just so,” said Withering; “you are quite right there, and I have frequently found myself posed by evidence that I felt must be assailable. Go on, and tell my friend what you were mentioning to me before he came in.”

“I am reluctant, sir,” said Stapylton, modestly, “to obtrude upon you, in a matter of such grand importance as this, the mere gossip of a mess-table, but, as allusion has been made to it, I can scarcely refrain. It was when serving in another Presidency an officer of ours, who had been long in Bengal, one night entered upon the question of Colonel Barrington's claims. He quoted the words of an uncle—I think he said his uncle—who was a member of the Supreme Council, and said, 'Barrington ought to have known we never could have conceded this right of sovereignty, but he ought also to have known that we would rather have given ten lacs of rupees than have it litigated.'”

“Have you that gentleman's name?” asked Barrington, eagerly.

“I have; but the poor fellow is no more,—he was of that fatal expedition to Beloochistan eight years ago.”

“You know our case, then, and what we claim?” asked Barrington.

“Just as every man who has served in India knows it,—popularly, vaguely. I know that Colonel Barrington was, as the adopted son of a Rajah, invested with supreme power, and only needed the ratification of Great Britain to establish a sovereignty; and I have heard”—he laid stress on the word “heard”—“that if it had not been for some allegation of plotting against the Company's government, he really might ultimately have obtained that sanction.”

“Just what I have said over and over again?” burst in Barrington. “It was the worst of treachery that mined my poor boy.”

“I have heard that also,” said Stapylton, and with a degree of feeling and sympathy that made the old man's heart yearn towards him.

“How I wish you had known him!” said he, as he drew his hand over his eyes. “And do you know, sir,” said he, warming, “that if I still follow up this suit, devoting to it the little that is left to me of life or fortune, that I do so less for any hope of gain than to place my poor boy before the world with his honor and fame unstained.”

“My old friend does himself no more than justice there!” cried Withering.

“A noble object,—may you have all success in it!” said Stapylton. He paused, and then, in a tone of deeper feeling, added: “It will, perhaps, seem a great liberty, the favor I'm about to ask; but remember that, as a brother soldier with your son I have some slight claim to approach you. Will you allow me to offer you such knowledge as I possess of India, to aid your suit? Will you associate me, in fact, with your cause? No higher one could there be than the vindication of a brave man's honor.”

“I thank you with all my heart and soul!” cried the old man, grasping his hand. “In my own name, and in that of my poor dear granddaughter, I thank you.”

“Oh, then, Colonel Barrington has left a daughter? I was not aware of that,” said Stapylton, with a certain coldness.

“And a daughter who knows no more of this suit than of our present discussion of it,” said Withering.

In the frankness of a nature never happier than when indulging its own candor, Barrington told how it was to see and fetch back with him the same granddaughter he had left a spot he had not quitted for years. “She 's coming back to a very humble home, it is true; but if you, sir,” said he, addressing Stapylton, “will not despise such lowly fare as a cottage can afford you, and would condescend to come and see us, you shall have the welcome that is due to one who wishes well to my boy's memory.”

“And if you do,” broke in Withering, “you'll see the prettiest cottage and the first hostess in Europe; and here 's to her health,—Miss Dinah Barrington!”

“I 'm not going to refuse that toast, though I have just passed the decanter,” said Peter. “Here 's to the best of sisters!”

“Miss Barrington!” said Stapylton, with a courteous bow; and he drained his glass to the bottom.

“And that reminds me I promised to be back to tea with her,” said Barrington; and renewing with all warmth his invitation to Stapylton, and cordially taking leave of his old friend, he left the house and hastened to his hotel.

“What a delightful evening I have passed, Dinah!” said he, cheerfully, as he entered.

“Which means that the Attorney-General gave you a grand review and sham fight of all the legal achievements of the term; but bear in mind, brother, there is no professional slang so odious to me as the lawyer's, and I positively hate a joke which cost six-and-eightpence, or even three-and-fourpence.” <

“Nothing of this kind was there at all, Dinah! Withering had a friend with him, a very distinguished soldier, who had seen much Indian service, and entered with a most cordial warmth into poor George's case. He knew it,—as all India knows it, by report,—and frankly told us where our chief difficulties lay, and the important things we were neglecting.”

“How generous! of a perfect stranger too!” said she, with a scarcely detectable tone of scorn.

“Not—so to say—an utter stranger, for George was known to him by reputation and character.”

“And who is, I suppose I am to say, your friend, Peter?”

“Captain or Major Stapylton, of the Regent's Hussars?”

“Oh! I know him,—or, rather, I know of him.”

“What and how, Dinah? I am very curious to hear this.”

“Simply, that while young Conyers was at the cottage he showed me a letter from that gentleman, asking him in the Admiral's name, to Cobham, and containing, at the same time, a running criticism on the house and his guests far more flippant than creditable.”

“Men do these things every day, Dinah, and there is no harm in it.”

“That all depends upon whom the man is. The volatile gayety of a high-spirited nature, eager for effect and fond of a sensation, will lead to many an indiscretion; but very different from this is the well-weighed sarcasm of a more serious mind, who not only shots his gun home, but takes time to sight ere he fires it. I hear that Captain Stapylton is a grand, cold, thoughtful man, of five or six-and-thirty. Is that so?”

“Perhaps he may be. He 's a splendid fellow to look at, and all the soldier. But you shall see for yourself, and I 'll warrant you 'll not harbor a prejudice against him.”

“Which means, you have asked him on a visit, brother Peter?”

“Scarcely fair to call it on a visit, Dinah,” blundered he out, in confusion; “but I have said with what pleasure we should see him under our roof when we returned.”

“I solemnly declare my belief, that if you went to a cattle-show you 'd invite every one you met there, from the squire to the pig-jobber, never thinking the while that nothing is so valueless as indiscriminate hospitality, even if it were not costly. Nobody thanks you,—no one is grateful for it.”

“And who wants them to be grateful, Dinah? The pleasure is in the giving, not in receiving. You see your friends with their holiday faces on, when they sit round the table. The slowest and dreariest of them tries to look cheery; and the stupid dog who has never a jest in him has at least a ready laugh for the wit of his neighbor.”

“Does it not spoil some of your zest for this pleasantry to think how it is paid for, brother?”

“It might, perhaps, if I were to think of it; but, thank Heaven! it's about one of the last things would come into my head. My dear sister, there's no use in always treating human nature as if it was sick, for if you do, it will end by being hypochondriac!”

“I protest, brother Peter, I don't know where you meet all the good and excellent people you rave about, and I feel it very churlish of you that you never present any of them to me!” And so saying, she gathered her knitting materials hastily together, and reminding him that it was past eleven o'clock, she uttered a hurried good-night, and departed.