in which he set down all his expenses, showed that he
knew how to live in London for upwards of three
months for the moderate sum of sixty-five pounds seven
shillings and fivepence.

Mr. Walpole sent his third son to Eton and to King's
College at Cambridge, not because he valued education,
even if education could now have been obtained in those
famous foundations, but because he designed the young
man to push his fortunes in the Church, then the usual
field for a cadet of decent family. But the youth had
higher destinies before him than fat livings and an easy
bishopric. His elder brother died in 1698, and Robert
the younger, becoming heir to the family estates, quitted
the university, and settled down with his convivial father
to learn all that pertains to the management of land and
the enjoyment of country life. It is said that Robert
the elder used to insist on making his son drink more
than his just share, on the ground that no son should
ever be allowed to have enough of his senses to see that
his father was tipsy. Amid such surroundings, which,
though compared with the more polished surface of
modern manners they seem coarse and rough, yet were
vigorous, hearty, and practical, Walpole reached his
twenty-fourth year. His father vowed that he would
make him the first grazier in the country. Higher
destinies were in store for him. The young squire,
under a homely exterior, covered a powerful under-
standing, a strong will, a good eye for men, and a union
of solid judgment with commanding ambition, which
fitted him to rule a kingdom, and to take his place
among the foremost men in Europe.

In the summer of 1700 he married Miss Catherine

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