HARRY DISNEY. CHAPTER I. THE IDEAL PORTRAIT. 'O fearful meditation! when, alack, Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid ? O, none, unless this miracle have might, OU ask me, my dear Atholl, to graphy which will throw a light upon the reasons that have induced me to quit the world, and to alienate myself from the faith of my fellow-countrymen. Often in the calm solitude of my present retreat VOL. I. B have I intended employing my leisure hours in sketching the most prominent features of my autobiography; but as often as I have commenced have I desisted. To rake up the painful memories of the past, and once more to make public facts which had better be forgotten, seemed on closer consideration to be fruitlessly reopening an old wound. De mortuis nil nisi bonum was the motto that stared me in the face, and made me throw down my pen in disgust before I had written fifty lines. Your letter, however, places the subject before me in a new light, and I hasten to execute your wish. Perhaps if the story of my life fail in adorning a tale, it may succeed in pointing a moral-at least, I hope so. I shall sketch with but a hasty hand my earlier years. All that is of interest in my career begins with that acquaintanceship which has led to results so strange and solemn. My father, as you know, was a clergyman of an old Devonshire family, and held one of the best livings in the county; but he lived up to the extent of his income, and, like many of his brethren, made no provision for the future. He was cold and haughty, full of prejudices and odd fancies. Proud of his old name and family position, he limited his circle of acquaintances to those who were either his superiors or equals among the gentry of the neighbourhood. He preached occasionally on Sunday, whilst his curates read prayers and visited the poor. With the exception of these hebdomadal discourses and the most attentive hospitalities offered to the archdeacon and occasionally to the bishop of his diocese, his clerical duties sat lightly upon him. He was keenly fond of sport of all kinds; was an excellent shot, rode well to hounds, and was as enthusiastic a fisherman as only a Devonshire man can be. As rector of an important parish, a man of family, and chairman of quarter sessions, he was treated with rather more deference than generally falls to the lot of country clergymen. My father belonged to the old school of parsons, who thought it far more important that a clergyman should be a gentleman than a religious or even an educated man. He had a horror of any of his brethren who were not Oxford or Cambridge men, and would never admit that a degree obtained from any but those Universities was a degree at all. He was very particular in his tastes, and nothing could be in better keeping than the various appointments of his establishment from his stables to his orchid - houses. He was very generous in his hospitalities; and though abstemious himself, the neighbouring gentry knew, by frequent experience, that the dinners and the wines. of the Rector of Lyscombe were well worth the drive of five or ten miles. My father read very little, and, beyond spending halfan-hour occasionally in filling-up his skeleton sermon, never paid any attention to study. Reading, I found out afterwards, always affected his head, and made him liable to epileptic fits. He passed his time chiefly in superintending the improvements going on in his garden (of which he was very proud), physicking his horses, and offering suggestions to his workpeople-or else in visiting the different families around. I have said that my father was a queer man; and certainly, on some subjects, he entertained very odd ideas. When he dined by himself, he commenced his dinner with some fruit, and then dined backwards; beginning with sweets, and so on through cheese, game, joint, fish, till he ended with soup. He kept an excellent table, |