Page:What will he do with it.djvu/741

Rh "Yes, to Lionel's marriage with that beautiful girl, whose parentage we never will ask. Great men are their own ancestors; why not sometimes fair women? Enough—I consent! I shall of course secure to my kinsman and his bride an ample fortune. Lionel will have time for his honeymoon before he departs for the wars. He will fight with good heart now, Dick. Young folks of the present day cannot bear up against sorrow as they were trained to do in mine. And that amiable lady who has so much pity for me, has, of course, still more pity for a charming young couple for whose marriage she schemed, in order to give me a home, Dick. And rather than she should pine and fall ill, and—no matter; all shall be settled as it should be for the happiness of the living. But something else must be settled; we must think of the dead as well as the living; and this name of Darrell shall be buried with me in the grave beside my father's. Lionel Haughton will keep to his own name. Live the Haughtons! Perish, but with no blot on their shield—perish the Darrells! Why, what is that? Tears, Dick? Pooh!—be a man! And I want all your strength; for you, too, must have a share in the sacrifice. What follows is not the dictate of pride, if I can read myself aright. No; it is the final completion and surrender of the object on which so much of my life has been wasted—but a surrender that satisfies my crotchets of honor. At all events, if it be pride in disguise, it will demand no victim in others; you and I may have a sharp pang—we must bear it, Dick."

"What on earth is coming now?" said Dick, dolefully.

"The due to the dead, Richard Fairthorn. This nook of fair England, in which I learned from the dead to love honor—this poor domain of Fawley—shall go in bequest to the College at which I was reared."

"Sir!"

"It will serve for a fellowship or two to honest, brave-hearted young scholars. It will be thus, while English institutions may last, devoted to Learning and Honor. It may sustain for mankind some ambition more generous than mine, it appears, ever was—settled thus, not in mine, but my dear father's name, like the Darrell Museum. These are my dues to the dead, Dick! And the old house thus becomes useless. The new house was ever a folly. They must go down both, as soon as the young folks are married; not a stone stand on stone! The plowshare shall pass over their sites! And this task I order you to see done. I have not strength. You will then hasten to join me