nothing was left save a few acres of ground, and the two-hundred-year-old house, which is itself crushed under a heavy mortgage. the last squire dragged out his existence there, living the horrible life of an aristocratic pauper; but his only son, my stepfather, seeing that he must adapt himself to the new conditions, obtained an advance from a relative, which enabled him to take a medical degree and went out to calcutta, where, by his professional skill and his force of character, he established a large practice. in a fit of anger, however, caused by some robberies which had been perpetrated in the house, he beat his native butler to death and narrowly escaped a capital sentence. as it was, he suffered a long term of imprisonment and afterwards returned to england a morose and disappointed man.