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Colston, by the Author of 'skating on Thin Ice'.
Colston by the Author of 'skating on Thin Ice' Author:Septimus Berdmore General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1869 Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million book... more »s for free. Excerpt: CHAPTER III. NEW HEIRS. John Evans and his family were not the only ones thrown into mourning at this period. Returning from Paris in one of the mail packet boats, Lord Leicester and Grant Haughton had completed half the passage, when a man fell overboard. In the attempt to save him, first one, then the other, of the friends, risked their lives. Nor were they alone in the work of the brave. Their valet plunged overboard, but boats were slowly lowered, a strong tide was running, night was coming on, and no one on board ever saw them again. If, in their lives as in others, there were sins of omission and commission, let those who would judge, place in the scale that weighs their life's conduct, the incident that closes it. Their brothers took their place as heirs presumptive of the Haughton and Berryshire Estates. A description of these will not be out of place here. The Haughtons had been settled in Berryshire (we give them the pas as the oldest family) for centuries. Their estates spread over hill and dale, including moorland, where grouse sprang wildly from blooming heather, and rich pastures, where thorough-brcds roamed, giving suck to dainty foals. Some ten thousand acres was about their extent, but as the grouse in the highlands, and the foxes in the lower grounds, ranged undisturbed over some third of this, the rents which were comparatively low, scarcely realised £7,000 a year, and the spendthrift ancestors had so encumbered it with mortgagees that, of this sum, but £2,000 found its way into the pocket of the present proprietor, the father of Grant, Edward, and Craven Haughton. If you ha...« less