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400 Blood, indeed! If my father had been a baker, I should know by this time where to look for my livelihood. As it is, I am told of nothing but my blood. Will my blood ever get me half a crown?'

And then the young democrat walked on again in solitude, leaving Mr. Oriel in doubt as to the exact line of argument which he had meant to inculcate.

still continued his visits to Greshamsbury, for Lady Arabella had not yet mustered the courage necessary for swallowing her pride and sending once more for Dr. Thorne. Nothing pleased Dr. Fillgrave more than those visits.

He habitually attended grander families, and richer people; but then, he had attended them habitually. Greshamsbury was a prize taken from the enemy; it was his rock of Gibraltar, of which he thought much more than of any ordinary Hampshire or Wiltshire which had always been within his own kingdom.

He was just starting one morning with his post-horses for Greshamsbury, when an impudent-looking groom, with a crooked nose, trotted up to his door. For Joe still had a crooked nose, all the doctor's care having been inefficacious to remedy the evil effects of Bridget's little tap with the rolling-pin. Joe had no written credentials, for his master was hardly equal to writing, and Lady Scatcherd had declined to put herself into further personal communication with Dr. Fillgrave; but he had effrontery enough to deliver any message.

'Be you Dr. Fillgrave?' said Joe, with one finger just raised to his cockaded hat.

'Yes,' said Dr. Fillgrave, with one foot on the step of the carriage, but pausing at the sight of so well-turned-out a servant. 'Yes; I am Dr. Fillgrave.'

'Then you be to go to Boxall Hill immediately; before anywhere else.'

'Boxall Hill!' said the doctor, with a very angry frown.

'Yes, Boxall Hill: my master's place—my master is Sir Louis Scatcherd, baronet. You've heard of him, I suppose?'

Dr. Fillgrave had not his mind quite ready for such an occasion. So he withdrew his foot from the carriage step, and rubbing his hands one over another, looked at his own hall door for inspiration. A single glance at his face was sufficient to show that no ordinary thoughts were being turned over within his breast.