sink into absolute inactivity. Therefore, and
because it was manifest that with help from a
younger man's energy the practice could in a
few years be doubled, he had thought of a
partner. Purchase-money for the practice was
no great consideration with him. His lawyer
had fixed it at eight hundred and fifty pounds.
He had himself no notion whatever of the sum
that should be asked; he did not care how it was
paid, and knew no more about law matters than
he did of Avicenna's——. Here he named a
work that I had never heard of, and gave an
impression of great knowledge in professing
ignorance. I went down to Beetleborough from
a sunny western village that defiled the air with
nothing coarser than a few wreaths of wood
smoke. I left there a benighted population, in
which every man, woman, and child not wearing
broadcloth or silk made formal reverence before
those textures. What I found was the place
where I now live, a rich scene blackened and
burnt, air thickened by day with smoke of a
hundred coke heaps. It is so ablaze by night
with the reflexion from blast-furnaces, that
friends from London who come down to visit us
in these our quiet days, for the first night or
two cannot convince themselves that there are not
houses on fire in every direction. Not a soul
then gave to my broadcloth more than a rough
stare. When, however, Dr. Hawley drove me
in his gig to see "one or two of his poor
pensioners," we had an insulting body-guard
of little boys behind us, all the way up a
hill.

"These are the free ways of the North," said
the good doctor.

Tidier people looked at us with marked
curiosity and interest, but I was glad to miss
all the servile obeisances to which I had been of
late accustomed.

Now that I have pulled through, it seems that
all this happened for the best. I think it did.
Nevertheless, for years and years I felt that if,
instead of offering to any one of those small boys
or of those wayfarers whom we met, a penny for
his thoughts, I had offered and paid even five
hundred pounds for the contents of the very
emptiest head of them all, they would have been
cheap to me at such a price. The juniors hooted
and the elders stared; but not a creature said a
word to save me from the ruin to which all
thought I was doomed.

In the doctor's house I could see ledger and
day-book. There was no lack of prescriptions
and of patients' names, with heavy accounts
registered as paid. I could ask my uncle to
come down and see things for himself. Doctor
Hawley entertained him blandly, left all to him
as a man of the world, admired T. Pawley, but
privately contrived to suggest that as T. P. was
young and somewhat romantic, the alliance with
a quiet old practitioner, who had experience of
life, would be the very thing to keep him out of
danger. Finally, the vicar came one evening,
with one or two of the more serious supports of
Beetleborough, and they supped with us at
Doctor Hawley's, when a goose was cooked.
Hereupon Uncle James was so far satisfied, that,
after the guests were gone, he came into my
bedroom, gave me friendly counsel, promised to
lend whatever of purchase-money was required
beyond my own three hundred pounds (minus
fifty paid for the Awakening of Flora), and
consented to the partnership.

Early the next morning he returned to Bradford.
I remained only to accept the terms of
our new friend before going westward to await
the arrival of a successor to the duties I was
quitting, and abide discussion raised by lawyers
on the deed of partnership I was about to sign.
Everything went well. I returned again to
Beetleborough; the deed was engrossed, and
one morning, after receipt of a satisfactory
letter from Uncle James, Doctor Ezekiel
Hawley took me to the den of a local lawyer,
where I signed what was to be signed and paid
what was to be paid, as first instalment of eight
hundred and fifty pounds, into what—though I
then believed in my new comrade—I could not
help feeling to be a very eager clutch. By the
next post came peremptory orders from my
uncle to sign nothing until he had got over a
difficulty that occurred to him. The partnership
was to be for seven years, at the end of
which, on consideration of a further payment,
Doctor Hawley would leave me in entire possession
of the field. Uncle James was convinced
that I should be unable to stand alone at the
end of seven years, when my age would be only
twenty-nine. It was essential that the seven
should be altered into ten.

The suggestion was not complimentary to me,
and it was one that I could not heartily back
without calling myself a simpleton. Moreover,
the papers were all signed; Doctor Hawley
declared that he would not pledge himself to more
than another seven years of work, and stood
firm to the letter of the bond. We adjourned
to Bradford. There I sturdily maintained that
I was bound in honour, as in law, to abide by
the agreement made. Then Uncle James
maintained as sturdily that Doctor Hawley could
not be an honest man, if he still held me bound,
young as I was, against the wishes of my family.
There Doctor Hawley held to his point with
much profession of benevolence. At the same
time, much to my great surprise, he contrived in a
bland manner to say things, almost true as to the
letter, but entirely false as to the spirit, that
inflamed my uncle's wrath against me. Then having
stung me in his anger to such answer as comes
of the pride of youth, my Uncle James retreated
to his inmost room.

Thither I followed him, and then I said:
"Uncle, I will not break my word because you
wish it, and because you promise to bear any
risk I run in doing so. Forgive me, though,
for having spoken warmly. You have been kind
to me for years, and love me now. I feel it, and
I meant no disrespect."

"Those are words," said Uncle James. "You,
a boy, set, up your judgment against that of your
elders. You are bent upon refusing all advice.
I give no more. Marry the trumpery girl