of Gilmore, the butler, was not attractive. He bore a very bad character with the villagers, among whom he was said to emulate in a humble manner the vices of his lord and master; he had been his companion and confidential servant for a great number of years, and it was not to be wondered at, even supposing that he commenced that servitude as an honest man, that his principles should have been sapped by the communication.

Those who had known Richard Gilmore best and longest, however, averred that his nature had not been the least impaired by this companionship, inasmuch as it had been always as bad as bad could be. I never saw his pale secretive face, with the thin lips tightly closed, as if to prevent the escape of one truant word, without reflecting what a repository of dark and wicked deeds that keeper of Sir Massingberd's conscience needs must be. Such men usually hold such masters in their own hands; for they know too much about them, and it is that species of knowledge which, above all others, is power. But it was not so in this case; the antecedents of Gilmore's master were probably as evil as those of any person who has ever kept a valet, but there was this peculiarity about the baronet—that he cared little or nothing whether people knew them or not. When a thoroughly unprincipled man has arrived at the stage of being entirely indifferent to what his fellow-creatures think of him, he has touched his zenith; he is as much a hero to his valet-de-chambre as to anybody else. It was Gilmore's nature to be reticent; but, for all Sir Massingberd cared, he might have ascended the steps at the stone-cross at Crittenden upon market-day, and held forth upon the subject of his master's peccadillos. Sir Massingberd stood no more in fear of him than of any other man; otherwise, he would scarcely have used such frightful language to him as he did whenever the spirit-case had not been properly replenished, or he happened to mislay the key of his own cigar-chest. It was no delicate tending that the lord of Fairburn Hall required; no accurate arrangement of evening garments ere he returned from shooting; no slippers placed in front of the fire. As he was attired in the morning, so he remained throughout the day, and, if it were the poaching season, throughout the night also. He never was ill, and only very rarely was he so overcome with liquor as to require any assistance in retiring. The putting Sir Massingberd to bed must have been a bad quarter of an hour for Mr. Gilmore. I have mentioned that when I paid my only visit to the Hall, the front-door bell was answered by the butler with very commendable swiftness, under the impression that it was his master; and, indeed, it was rumoured that, on more than one 

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