Twice in each week, on Sunday and Wednesday, Giovanna dined at the Chase. It was a standing invitation which included Mrs. Tew, while Everard Lisle made a frequent fifth at the table. Luigi was there as a matter of course.

With his acknowledgment of his grandson and his daughter-in-law a fresh element had been imported into Sir Gilbert\'s life; but settled habits had too strong a hold upon him, and the groove in which he habitually moved had been trodden by him for too many years to allow of much deviation on his part, even under circumstances so exceptional as those the evolution of which we have thus far followed.

The fact of Luigi being now domiciled at the Chase in no way influenced or affected the position of Everard Lisle. Seeing that his grandson could neither play chess nor backgammon, Sir Gilbert was still as much dependent on Lisle as before for his after-dinner game, which seemed to have now become one of the settled institutions of his life.

If between Everard and Luigi there was no particular show of cordiality, as there certainly was not, there was at least a veneer of friendliness which, as is so often the case, served as a very fair substitute for the real article. Indeed, Lisle on his part had no desire to be on other than friendly terms with his employer\'s grandson; but Luigi would gladly have given a helping hand, could he have seen his way to do so, in causing the other to be sent about his business; or have taken steps to poison his grandfather\'s mind against him, had he not felt that the game was too dangerous a one to be entered upon while his own footing at the Chase had about it such elements of instability. That he was secretly jealous of Everard\'s influence over Sir Gilbert and of the latter\'s undisguised liking for him, hardly needs to be recorded; but he had wit enough to allow nothing of it to be seen on the surface; besides which, both his time and his thoughts were just then occupied with matters which concerned him far more nearly.

As may, or may not, be borne in mind by the reader, Sir Gilbert, at a certain memorable interview, intimated that, in his opinion, it was not too late for Luigi to apply himself to the acquisition of certain of those accomplishments which he, the Baronet, held to be essential to the education of a gentleman. Thus it came to pass that Luigi had not been more than a week at the Chase before he found himself put into the hands of the Rev. Eldred Merton, the vicar of St. Michael\'s, who had been known in his time as a successful "coach," with a view of having at least a smattering of classical lore instilled into him.

Then for Luigi began a period of purgatory, such as in his after-life he never looked back to without a shudder. He was utterly devoid of linguistic gifts, in any case as far as the dead languages were concerned, and before long he became the despair of his tutor; who, however, would not acknowledge himself beaten, for one reason, perhaps, because, being a married man with a numerous family, Sir Gilbert\'s guineas were very acceptable to him. So, four mornings in each week saw Luigi at the vicarage, and when his two hours\' lesson had come to an end, it would have been hard to say whether pupil or tutor was the more rejoiced of the two.

But there was another series of lessons which Luigi was compelled by his grandfather to undergo, and which to him were a source of torture almost as keen, although different in kind, as that caused him by his classical studies. The lessons in question were those necessitated by the art of learning to ride. As it happened, Luigi had never been on horseback in his life, nor would he ever of his own free will have aspired to that "bad eminence." Both morally and physically he was an arrant coward, and, from his point of view, everyone who bestrode a horse ran a certain amount of risk to life and limb, which, for his part, he would very gladly have eschewed had it been in his power to do so. But his grandfather\'s orders were imperative, and there was nothing for him but to obey with the best grace possible. So, there being no such thing as a riding-school at Mapleford, Mr. Marsh from the livery-stables came over to the Chase on three afternoons in each week "in order to put the young squire through his paces," as he termed it. Never, as later on he openly avowed, had he had a pupil who made such slow progress and did him so little credit. "He\'s a regular funker, that\'s what he is,"............