Cashel Byron's Profession

Alice Goff, when she heard of Lydia's projected marriage, saw that

she must return to Wiltstoken, and forget her brief social splendor

as soon as possible. She therefore thanked Miss Carew for her

bounty, and begged to relinquish her post of companion. Lydia

assented, but managed to delay this sacrifice to a sense of duty and

necessity until a day early in winter, when Lucian gave way to a

hankering after domestic joys that possessed him, and allowed his

cousin to persuade him to offer his hand to Alice. She indignantly

refused--not that she had any reason to complain of him, but because

the prospect of returning to Wiltstoken made her feel ill used, and

she could not help revenging her soreness upon the first person whom

she could find a pretext for attacking. He, lukewarm before, now

became eager, and she was induced to relent without much difficulty.

Lucian was supposed to have made a brilliant match; and, as it

proved, he made a fortunate one. She kept his house, entertained his

guests, and took charge of his social connections so ably that in

course of time her invitations came to be coveted by people who were

desirous of moving in good society. She was even better looking as a

matron than she had been as a girl; and her authority in matters of

etiquette inspired nervous novices with all the terrors she had

herself felt when she first visited Wiltstoken Castle. She invited

her brother-in-law and his wife to dinner twice a year--at midsummer

and Easter; but she never admitted that either Wallace Parker or

Cashel Byron were gentlemen, although she invited the latter freely,

notwithstanding the frankness with which he spoke to strangers after

dinner of his former exploits, without deference to their

professions or prejudices. Her respect for Lydia remained so great

that she never complained to her of Cashel save on one occasion,

when he had shown a bishop, whose house had been recently broken

into and robbed, how to break a burglar's back in the act of

grappling with him.

The Skenes returned to Australia and went their way there, as Mrs.

Byron did in England, in the paths they had pursued for years

before. Cashel spoke always of Mrs. Skene as "mother," and of Mrs.

Byron as "mamma."

William Paradise, though admired by the fair sex for his strength,

courage, and fame, was not, like Cashel and Skene, wise or fortunate

enough to get a good wife. He drank so exceedingly that he had but

few sober intervals after his escape from the law. He claimed the

title of champion of England on Cashel's retirement from the ring,

and challenged the world. The world responded in the persons of

sundry young laboring men with a thirst for glory and a taste for

fighting. Paradise fought and prevailed twice. Then he drank while

in training, and was beaten. But by this time the ring had again

fallen into the disrepute from which Cashel's unusual combination of

pugilistic genius with honesty had temporarily raised it; and the

law, again seizing Paradise as he was borne vanquished from the

field, atoned for its former leniency by incarcerating him for six

months. The abstinence thus enforced restored him to health and

vigor; and he achieved another victory before he succeeded in

drinking himself into his former state. This was his last triumph.

With his natural ruffianism complicated by drunkenness, he went

rapidly down the hill into the valley of humiliation. After becoming

noted for his readiness to sell the victories he could no longer

win, he only appeared in the ring to test the capabilities of

untried youths, who beat him to their hearts' content. He became a

potman, and was immediately discharged as an inebriate. He had sunk

into beggary when, hearing in his misery that his former antagonist

was contesting a parliamentary election, he applied to him for alms.

Cashel at the time was in Dorsetshire; but Lydia relieved the

destitute wretch, whose condition was now far worse than it had been

at their last meeting. At his next application, which followed soon,

he was confronted by Cashel, who bullied him fiercely, threatened to

break every bone in his skin if he ever again dared to present

himself before Lydia, flung him five shillings, and bade him be

gone. For Cashel retained for Paradise that contemptuous and

ruthless hatred in which a duly qualified professor holds a quack.

Paradise bought a few pence-worth of food, which he could hardly

eat, and spent the rest in brandy, which he drank as fast as his

stomach would endure it. Shortly afterwards a few sporting papers

reported his death, which they attributed to "consumption, brought

on by the terrible injuries sustained by him in his celebrated fight

with Cashel Byron."