His Grace — page 281: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

HIS GRACE. 275 I quite forgot that you were his brother-in-law now. : Please, give him my kindest remembrances when you write, and tell him that we have some idea of becoming his tenants. Mr. Gascoigne feels that the castle ought to be occupied by one of the family; so, if he doesn't want too exorbitant a rent for the place, we may take it off his hands.” : “Am I to consider this a formal offer, Mrs. Gas- coigne?” [I inquired. She hesitated for a moment and then replied: “Well, you can mention it when you write, anyhow. Personally, I should be only too glad to do anything that I could to help him out of his embarrassments, poor fellow!” It is scarcely necessary for me to say that I did not transmit the above kindly message. Some weeks later it became my duty to transmit to my brother-in-law a message of an infinitely more agreeable character. Amongst the entailed estates which he had inherited was a barren tract of land, lying some twenty or thirty miles to the northward of the Castle, which in the late duke’s time had gradually fallen out of cultivation, owing to the poverty of the soil, and which we now retained in our own hands for grazing purposes. It was of little value, as we thought, for that or any other purpose ; but a few months before a suspicion had arisen of the existence of coal beneath the surface, and, permission having been obtained to make investi- gations, the suspicion had by this time become con- verted into a certainty. I had said nothing about it to Hurstbourne, because I knew that if he were told, he would at once jump to the conclusion that boundless wealth was within his grasp and would act accordingly ; Eomicboo cS (E(0) m