Trained by his mother from
infancy to consider the Trevellian blood the best in England outside the
pale of royalty, and the McPherson blood the best outside the peerage,
it was not strange that his good qualities--and he had many--should be
warped, and dwarfed, and overshadowed by an indomitable pride and
supreme selfishness, which would prompt him at any time to sacrifice his
best friend in behalf of his own interest. And yet Neil was generally a
favorite, for he was frank, and obliging, and good-humored, and very
gentlemanly in his manner, and quick to render the little attentions so
gratifying to the ladies, by whom he was held in high esteem as a
pattern boy. He was the idol of his mother, who saw no fault in him
whatever, and who had commenced already to plan for him a brilliant
marriage, or at least a marriage of money, for her own income was not
large, and that of her husband smaller still.
Blanche Trevellian, whom Neil had designated as tow-haired, and
white-browed, was her grand-niece, and Neil's second cousin, and as
heiress to ten thousand a year, she might develop into a desirable
_parti_, notwithstanding her ordinary appearance now.
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