Birds of Prey

eople of the middle class, accounted monstrously genteel in their ow

at which eating and drinking were the leading features of the day's entertainment. Mr. Halliday had always regarded George and Philip Sheldon with that reverential admiration which a stupid man, who is conscious of his own mental inferiority, generally feels for a clever friend and companion. But he was also fully aware of the advantage which a rich man possesses over a poor one, and would not have exchanged the fertile acres of Hyley for the intellectual gifts of his schoolfellows. He had found the substantial value of his comfortably furnished house and well-stocked farm when he and his friend Philip Sheldon became suitors for the hand of Georgina Cradock, youngest daughter of a Barlingford attorney, who lived next door to the Barlingford dentist, Philip Sheldon's father. Philip and t

r did Philip Sheldon give evidence of any extravagant despair. His father was something of a doctor as well as a dentist; and there were plenty of dark little phials lurking on the shelves of his surgery in which the young man could have found "mortal drugs" without the aid of the apothecary, had he been so minded. Happily no such desperate idea ever occurred to him in connection with his grief. He held himself sulkily aloof from

s a clean cage and is supplied with abundant seed and water. The cage is eminently comfortable, and the sleepy, respectable, elderly bird sighs for no better abiding-place, no wider prospect than that patch of the universe whic

ny that had been dug by that ceremonial in the parish church of Barlingford. Philip Sheldon had awakened to the consciousness that life in his native town was little more than a kind of animal vegetation - the life of some pulpy invertebrate creature, which sprawls helplessly upon the sands whereon the wave has deposited it,

happening at the same time very conveniently to depart this life, Philip, the son and heir, disposed of the business to an aspiri

m, and the man who had been his successful rival. He set himself to watch them with the cool deliberation of a social anatomist, and he experienced very little difficulty in the performance of this moral dissection. They were establis

monial disputants were sufficiently appreciative of this good breeding. They would have liked to have had Mr. Sheldon for a court of appeal; and a little interference from him would have given zest to their quarrels. Meanwhile Philip watched them slyly from the covert of his n

he days of her spinsterhood. She was a pretty, weak little woman, whose education had never gone beyond the routine of a provincial boarding-school, and who believed that she had attained all necessary wisdom in having mastered Pinnock's abridgments of Goldsmith's histories and the

wondered how he could ever have felt even as much as he had felt on her account. But he had little leisure to devote

usement: went to exhibitions in the day and to theatres at night, and came home to cozy little suppers in Fitzgeorge-street, after which Mr. H

ll racecourses, being always ready for any amusement his friends proposed to him. It followed, therefore, that he was very often absent from his commonplace substantial home, and his pretty weak-minded wife. And poor Georgy had ample food for her jealous fears and suspicions; for where might a man not be who was so seldom at home? She had never been particularly fond of her husband, but that was no reason why she should not be particularly jealous about him; and her jealousy betrayed itself in a peevish worrying fashion, which was ha

ught his wife as many stiff silk gowns and gaudy Barlingford bonnets as she chose to sigh for. He made a will,

marry again, my lass, so I've no need to tie up Lottie's little fortune. I must trust some one, and I'd better confide in my little wife than in some canting methodistical fellow of a trustee, who would s

ld keep his promise faithfully so long as no supreme temptation, in the shape of a visit from some friend of the jolly-good-fellow species, arose to vanquish his good resolutions. But a good-tempered, generous-hearted young man who farms his own land, has three or four good hors

rothers; and it was George who lured him from the safe shelter of Fitzgeorge-street and took him to mysterious haunts, whence

me - half-doz' oyst'r - c'gar - botl' p'l ale - str't home," and much more to the same effect. When did any married man ever take more than half a dozen oysters - or take any undomestic

which had begun in sunshine, threatened to end in storm and darkness. Georgy Sheldon and his set had taken possession of the young farmer; and Georgy had no better amusement in the long blustrous March evenings than to sit at h

been jilted by her. The Fitzgeorgians had been, therefore, especially on the alert to detect any sign of backsliding in the dentist. There would have been much pleasant discussion in kitchens and back-parlours if Mr. Sheldon had been particularly attentive to his fair guest; but it speedily became known, always by the agency of Mrs. Woolper and that phenomenon of idleness and ini

t things imaginable - land of such fertility as one would scarcely expect to find out of Arcadia - live stock which seemed beyond all price, to be taken at a valuation. - roads and surrounding neighbourhood unparalleled in beauty and convenience - outbuildings that must have been the very archetypes of barns and stables - a house which to inhabit would be to adore. But as yet he had seen none of these peerless domains. He was waiting for decent weather in which to run down to the West and "look about him," as he said to himself. In the meantime the blustrous March weather, which was so unsuited to long railro

or which melancholy madness would surely overtake many desolate matrons in houses whose common place comfort and respectable dulness are more dismal than the picturesque dreariness of a moated grange amid the Lincolns

ht his guest an e

like to see. I wish I had a piano, or some female acquaintances to drop in upon y

"and if Tom cared for me, he wouldn't leave me like th

a few minutes in silence, beating time to some imaginary air with the tips of his fing

en a little wild since his coming to London, I kno

ing to Barlingford with somebody or other, or to meet some of his old frie

ys ago how he had made a will leaving you every sixpence he possesses, with

ood husband. I don't want him to leave me his money.

lliday; you made your choice, you know, without regard to the feelings of any one else. You sacrificed truth and honour to your own i

t this was the first time he had ever said anything to her that sounded like a reproach. The dentist's eyes softened a little as he watched her, not with any special tenderness, but with an expression of half-disdainful compassion - such as a strong stern man might feel for a foolish child. He could see that this woman was a

ainst the inheritor of Hyley Farm with its two hundred and fifty acres, and three thousand pounds' worth of live stock, plant, and working capital? When do the prudent people ever stop to consider truth and honour, or o

take refuge in tears when they find themselves at a disadvantage. Tears had always melte

d make her cry. She was a necessary instrument in the working out of certain plans that he had made for himself, and he was anxious to discover whether she was likely to be a plastic instrument. He knew that her love for him had never been worth much at its best, and that the poor l

ll that my marriage with Tom was pa's doing, and not mine. I'm sure if I'd known how he would stay out night a

se just such another man as Tom - a man who laughs loud, and pays flourishing compliments, and drives a g

sery of married life. But I don't want Tom to die, unkind as he is to me. People are always saying that he won't make old bones - how horrid

r of her utterance, and Mr. Sheldon was fa

I daresay he'll live to be a hale, hearty old man, in spite of the croakers. People always will croak about something; and it's a kind of fashion to say that a big, hearty, six-foot man is a fragile blossom likely to be nipped by any w

shook her he

ill be home till after twelve. He doesn't like my sitting up for him;

imed Mr. Sheldon cheerfully. "I'

iday; "he will have had his supper when he comes home, y

e sat opposite his visitor, and watched her, silently and thoughtfully, for some time as she worked. She had brushed away her tears, but she looked very peevish and miserable, and took

tation about it. There were subjects that forced themselves upon his thoughts, and certain ideas which repeated themselves with a stupid persistence. He was such an eminently practical man, that this disorder of his brain troubled him more even than the thoughts that made the disorder. He sat in the same attitude for a long while, scarcely conscious of Mrs. Halliday's presence, not at all conscious of the progre

intently a midnight watcher may be listening for the returning wanderer's knock, it is not the less startling when it

according to the popular idea of masculine perfection, but he had not a pleasant smile. "I went through the regular rou

s of angels - and had been taking his supper in a place which duchesses themselves did not disdain to peep at from the sacred recesses of a loge grillee, George Sheldon had told him. But poor country-bred Georgina Halliday would not believe in the duchesses, or the angelic singing boys, or the primitive simplicity of Welsh rarebits. She had a vision of beautiful women, and

dry ones, or to go to bed immediately. He stood before the fire relating his innocent adventures, and trying to dispel the

good-tempered reprobate good night. "Never mind, old fellow," answered Tom; "if I am ill, you shall nurse me. If one is doom

r. Halliday went blundering up the sta

minutes. Then he went slowly back to the sitting-room, where he replenis

ed, if I can't sleep?" he mut