'My dear boy,' he said to Charles, 'there will be
nothing left for you. I am a ruined man.' And here follows for me
the strangest part of this story. From the death of the
treacherous aunt, Charles Jenkin, senior, had still some nine years
to live; it was perhaps too late for him to turn to saving, and
perhaps his affairs were past restoration. But his family at least
had all this while to prepare; they were still young men, and knew
what they had to look for at their father's death; and yet when
that happened in September, 1831, the heir was still apathetically
waiting. Poor John, the days of his whips and spurs, and Yeomanry
dinners, were quite over; and with that incredible softness of the
Jenkin nature, he settled down for the rest of a long life, into
something not far removed above a peasant. The mill farm at
Stowting had been saved out of the wreck; and here he built himself
a house on the Mexican model, and made the two ends meet with
rustic thrift, gathering dung with his own hands upon the road and
not at all abashed at his employment.
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