The yeomanly
churl!--I would give something to know how he has got such a hank
over me. What are Menie Gray's engagements to him? She has given him his
answer, and what right has he to come betwixt her and me? If old Moncada
had done a grandfather's duty, and made suitable settlements on me, this
plan of marrying the sweet girl, and settling here in her native place,
might have done well enough. But to live the life of the poor drudge her
father--to be at the command and call of every boor for twenty miles
round!--why, the labours of a higgler, who travels scores of miles to
barter pins, ribbons, snuff and tobacco, against the housewife's private
stock of eggs, mort-skins, and tallow, is more profitable, less
laborious, and faith I think, equally respectable. No, no,--unless I can
find wealth nearer home, I will seek it where every one can have it for
the gathering; and so I will down to the Swan Inn, and hold a final
consultation with my friend."
CHAPTER THE FIFTH.
The friend whom Middlemas expected to meet at the Swan, was a person
already mentioned in this history by the name of Tom Hillary, bred an
attorney's clerk in the ancient town of Novum Castrum--_doctus utriusque
juris_, as far as a few months in the service of Mr. Lawford, Town-clerk
of Middlemas, could render him so. The last mention that we made of this
gentleman, was when his gold-laced hat veiled its splendour before the
fresher mounted beavers of the 'prentices of Dr.
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