Chapter XII: Part 12

Roger went back to his regiment in Ireland soon after the date given in the foregoing extract; but the Carabineers were finally removed to Canterbury, and in the summer he again got leave of absence, which he spent with his aunt and cousin in London, and at Tichborne; and it was on the 22d of June 1852, that the young people walked together for the last time in the garden of Tichborne house. They talked of the future hopefully; and for her comfort he told her a secret. Some months before that time he had made a vow, and written out and signed it solemnly. It was in these words:--"I make on this day a promiss, that if I marry my Cousin Kate Doughty, this year, or before three years are over, at the latest, to build a church or chapel at Tichborne to the Holy Virgin, in thanksgiving for the protection which she has showed us in praying God that our wishes might be fulfilled." Roger went back to his regiment and indulged his habitual melancholy. To his great regret, the order for the Carabineers to go to India had been countermanded; but he had no intention of leading the dull round of barrack life in Canterbury. He had determined to go abroad for a year and a half or two years; by that time the allotted period of trial would be near an end. He had determined to leave a profession which offered no outlet for his energies. The tame round of the cities and picture-galleries of Europe had no charms for him. Among the many books which he had read at this time were the Indian romances of Chateaubriand, "René," "Attila," and "Le Dernier Abencerage." How deeply these stories had impressed his mind is apparent in his letters to Lady Doughty. "Happy," he says, "was the life of René. He knew how to take his troubles with courage, and keep them to himself,--retired from all his friends to be more at liberty to think about his sorrows and misfortunes, and bury them in himself. I admire that man for his courage; that is, the courage to carry those sorrows to the grave which drove him into solitude." Among his intimate friends and schoolfellows at Stonyhurst, was Mr. Edward Waterton, whose father, the celebrated naturalist, had given to the college a collection of stuffed foreign birds and other preserved animals; and there can be no doubt that the famous narratives of adventure in South America of that distinguished traveller were among the books which Roger and other college friends read at that period. How deeply the splendours of the natural history collection of Stonyhurst had impressed the mind of the boy is evidenced in the fact that Roger took delight at school in practising the art of preserving birds and other animals; while long afterwards, in humble emulation of the great naturalist's achievement, he gathered and sent home, when on his travels, many a specimen of birds of splendid plumage. South America, in short, had long been the subject of his dreams; and now in travelling in that vast continent, he would try to find occupation for the mind, and get through the long time of waiting which he had undertaken to bear patiently. His scheme was to spend a twelvemonth in Chili, Guayaquil, and Peru, seeing not only wild scenes but famous cities; thence to visit Mexico, and so by way of the United States find his way back to England. Having taken this resolution, he set about putting his affairs in order, for Roger was a man of business-like habits, and by no means prone to neglect his worldly interests. He made his will,--saying, however, as he remarked in one of his letters, "nothing about the church or chapel at Tichborne," which he said he would only build under the conditions mentioned in a paper which he had left in the hands of his dearest and most trusted friend, Mr. Gosford, the steward of the family estates. In truth, months before the day when he gave Miss Doughty a copy of "The Vow" in the garden at Tichborne, he had solemnly signed and sealed up a compact with his own conscience, and deposited it with other precious mementoes of that time in his friend's safe keeping. Parting with friends in England cost him, perhaps, but little sorrow, for his mind was full of projects to be carried into effect on his return. He aspired to the character of a traveller, and to be qualified for membership at the Travellers' Club, where, in one of his letters while abroad, he requests that his name may be inscribed as a candidate. He had an old habit of keeping diaries, and he promised to send extracts, and, after all, the time would not be long. There was one house in which Roger naturally shrank from saying farewell. He had made a solemn resolution that he would go to Tichborne no more while matters remained thus, and his pride was wounded by what appeared to him to be a want of confidence on the part of Lady Doughty. In a worldly point of view it is difficult to conceive any union more desirable than that of the two cousins. But it is clear that the mother trembled for the future of her child. Hence she still gave ready ear to tales of the wild life of the regiment, and hinted them in her letters to her nephew in a way that made him angry, but not vindictive. He was asked to go and see his uncle, Sir Edward, before starting; but his will was inflexible, and he went away, as he had all along said that he would, resolved to bury his sorrows within himself. Roger went away in February, and spent nearly three weeks in Paris with his parents and some old friends of his early days. His mother was much averse to his plan of travelling; and she opposed it both by her own upbraidings, and by the persuasion of spiritual advisers who had influence over her son. But it was of no avail. Roger had chosen to sail in a French vessel from Havre--"La Pauline"--and sail he would. His voyage to Valparaiso was to last four months, and thence he was going on in the same vessel to Peru. It was doubtless because of the strong hold which the French language and many French manners still had on him, that, though he took an English servant with him, he preferred a French ship with a French captain and French seamen. On the 1st of March, 1853, he sailed away from Europe, and, as we are bound to believe, never returned. The "Pauline" started with bad weather, which detained her in the Channel, and compelled her to put in at Falmouth, but after that she made a good voyage round Cape Horn to Valparaiso, where she arrived on the 19th of June. As the vessel was to remain there a month, Roger, after spending a week in Valparaiso, started with his servant John Moore to see Santiago, the capital of Chili, about ninety miles inland. Thence he returned and sailed for Peru, where he embarked for places in the north. At Santiago his servant had been taken ill, and, though recovering, was unfitted to travel. His master thereupon furnished him with funds to set up a store, and took another servant, with whom he underwent many adventures. At Lima he visited the celebrated churches, and purchased souvenirs for his friends and relatives. Having stored a little yacht with provisions, he started with his servant on a voyage of about three hundred miles up the river Guayaquil, and was for some days under the Line; he made similar journeys in a canoe with his servant and two Indians, still bent on collecting and preserving rare birds of gorgeous plumage. He also visited and explored silver and copper mines. During all this travelling he continued his home correspondence with great regularity. But the first news he received was bad. Scarcely had the "Pauline" left sight of our shores, when Sir Edward Doughty died, and Roger's father and mother were now Sir James and Lady Tichborne. By and by the wanderer began to retrace his steps, came back to Valparaiso, and with his last new servant, Jules Berraut, rode thence in one night ninety miles to Santiago again. Again he started with muleteers and servants on the difficult and perilous journey over the Cordilleras, and thence across the Pampas to Buenos Ayres, Monte Video, and Rio de Janeiro. In April 1854, there was in the harbour of Rio a vessel which hailed from Liverpool, and was called the "Bella." She was about to sail for Kingston, Jamaica, and it was to Kingston that Roger had directed his letters and remittances to be forwarded, that being a convenient resting place on his journey to Mexico, where he intended to spend a few months. The "Bella" was a full-rigged ship of nearly 500 tons burden, clipper-built, and almost new. Aboard this ship, then taking in her cargo of coffee and logwood, came one April morning a young English gentleman who introduced himself as Mr. Tichborne. He was dressed in a half tourist, half nautical costume, and wanted a passage to Kingston. Travelling with servants, hiring yachts and canoes, buying paintings, curiosities, and natural history specimens, had proved more expensive than he expected. His funds were exhausted; nor could his purse be replenished until he got to Kingston, where letters of credit were expected to be waiting for him. It was some little time before the captain believed the young man's story, but when he did, he not only undertook to convey him and his people to Kingston; he determined to help him in a matter of some delicacy and not a little danger; for when the vessel was near sailing, Roger was found to be without that indispensable requisite, a passport. Great excitement then prevailed in Brazil on the subject of runaway slaves. Black slaves had escaped by making themselves stowaways; "half-caste" people, relying on their comparative fairness of skin, had openly taken passage as seamen or even passengers, and thus got away from a hateful life of bondage. Hence the peremptory regulation that no captain should sail with a stranger aboard without an official license. Under these circumstances a plan was devised by the captain. When the Government officers came aboard, no Tichborne or other stranger was visible. As the vessel, loosened from her moorings, was slowly drifting down the harbour in the morning, the officers sat at a little table on deck, smoked and drank with the captain. At length the moment came to call their boat and take farewell, wishing the good ship "Bella" and her valuable freight a pleasant voyage. Scarcely had they departed, when the table was removed; and just beneath where they had been sitting a circular plug closing the entrance to what is known as the "lazarette" was lifted, and out came Roger laughing at the success of their harmless device. Before noon the "Bella" had passed from the harbour of Rio into the open ocean, and was soon on her voyage northward. That was on the 20th of April 1854, and that is the last ever known in good sooth of the "Bella," except as a foundered vessel. Six days after she had left the port of Rio, a ship, traversing her path, found tokens of a wreck--straw bedding such as men lay on deck in hot latitudes, a water-cask, a chest of drawers, and among other things a long boat floating bottom upwards, and bearing on her stern the ominous words "Bella, Liverpool." These were brought into Rio, and forthwith the Brazilian authorities caused steam vessels to go out and scour the seas in quest of survivors; but none were seen. That the "Bella" had foundered there was little room to doubt; though the articles found were chiefly such as would have been on her deck. Even the items of cabin furniture were known to have been placed on deck to make way for merchandise, with which she was heavily laden. The night before these articles were found had been gusty, but there had been nothing like a storm. When time went by and brought no tidings, Captain Oates, a great friend of the captain of the "Bella," who had been instrumental in getting Roger on board, came with other practical seamen to the conclusion that she had been caught in a squall; that her cargo of coffee had shifted; and that hence, unable to right herself, the "Bella" had gone down in deep water, giving but little warning to those on board. In a few months this sorrowful news was brought to Tichborne, where there was of course great mourning. One by one the heirs of the old house were disappearing; and now it seemed that all the hopes of the family must be centred in Alfred, then a boy of fifteen. So, at least, felt Sir James Tichborne. He had inquiries made in America and elsewhere. For a time there was a faint hope that some aboard the "Bella" had escaped, and had, perhaps, been rescued. But months went by, and still there was no sign. The letters of news that poor Roger had so anxiously asked to be directed to him at the Post Office, Kingston, Jamaica, remained there till the paper grew faded. The banker's bill, which was wanted to pay the passage money, lay at the agents, but neither the captain nor his passenger of the "Bella" came to claim it. Weeks and months rolled on; the annual allowance of one thousand a year, which was Roger's by right, was paid into Glyn & Co.'s bank, but no draft upon it was ever more presented at their counters. The diligent correspondent ceased to correspond. At Lloyd's the unfortunate vessel was finally written down upon the "Loss Book"--the insurance was paid to the owners, and in time the "Bella" faded away from the memories of all but those who had lost friends or relatives in her. Lady Tichborne was always full of hope that her son had been saved, and could never be brought to regard him as drowned; but we have now seen the last of the real Roger Tichborne, and our next business will be with the counterfeit.

At last, in the neighbourhood in which Sir James and his wife lived, it became notorious that the mother was prepared to receive any one kindly who professed to have news of her son, and naturally when the story once got wind there were many who tried to profit by her credulity. Among other adventurers, a tramp in the dress of a sailor found his way to Tichborne, and, having poured into the willing ears of the poor mother a wild story about some of the survivors of the "Bella" being picked up off the coast of Brazil, and carried to Melbourne, was forthwith regaled and rewarded. There is a freemasonry among beggars which sufficiently explains the fact, that very soon the appearance of ragged sailors in Tichborne Park became common. Sailors with one leg, and sailors with one arm, loud-voiced, blustering seamen, and seamen whose troubles had subdued their tones to a plaintive key, all found their way to the back door of the great house. Every one of them had heard something about the "Bella's" crew being picked up; and could tell more on that subject than all the owners, or underwriters, or shipping registers in the world. And poor Lady Tichborne believed, as is evidenced by a letter of hers written in 1857, only three years after the shipwreck, to a gentleman in Melbourne, imploring him to make inquiries for her son in that part of the world. Sir James, however, though no less sorrowful, had no faith; and he made short work of tramping sailors who came to impose on the poor lady with their unsubstantial legends. But Sir James died in 1862. Shortly before this event his only surviving son Alfred had married Theresa, a daughter of the eleventh Lord Arundel of Wardour. This, however, did not prevent the mother, in one of her crazy moods, taking a step calculated to induce some impostor to come forward and claim to be the rightful heir--which was the insertion of an advertisement in the _Times_, offering a reward for the discovery of her eldest son, and giving a number of particulars with regard to his birth, parentage, age, date and place of shipwreck, name of vessel, and other matters. She also incorporated in her advertisement the stories of the tramping sailors about his having been picked up and carried to Melbourne; and this mischievous advertisement was published in various languages, and doubtless copied in the South American and Australian newspapers. This is the first step we find towards the formation of the imposture.

Time rolled on, and no Roger, true or false, made his appearance. One day the Dowager happened to see in a newspaper a mention of the fact that there was in Sydney a man named Cubitt, who kept what he called a "Missing Friends' Office." To Cubitt accordingly she wrote a long rambling letter, in which, among other tokens of her state of mind, she gave a grossly incorrect account of her son's appearance, and even of his age; but Cubitt was to insert her long advertisement in the Australian papers, and he was promised a handsome reward. Cubitt, in reply, amused the poor lady with vague reports of her son being found in the capacity of a private soldier in New Zealand; and as there was war there at that time the poor lady wrote back in an agony of terror to entreat that he might be bought out of the regiment. Mr. Cubitt soon perceived the singular person he had to deal with; and his letters from that time were largely occupied with requests for money for services which had no existence out of the letters. At last came more definite information. A Mr. Gibbes, an attorney at the little town of Wagga-Wagga, two hundred miles inland from Sydney, had, he said, found the real Roger living "in a humble station of life," and under an assumed name. Again money was wanted. Then Gibbes, apparently determined to steal a march on Cubitt, wrote directly to the credulous lady, and there was much correspondence between them. At first there were some little difficulties. The man who, after a certain amount of coyness, had pleaded guilty to being the long-lost heir, still held aloof in a strange way, concealed his present name and occupation, and instead of going home at once, preferred to bargain for his return through the medium of an attorney and the keeper of a missing-friends' office. All this, however, did not shake the faith of Lady Tichborne. Then he gave accounts of himself which did not in the least tally with the facts of Roger's life. He said he was born in Dorsetshire, whereas Roger was born in Paris; he accounted for being an illiterate man by saying that he had suffered greatly in childhood from St. Vitus's dance, which had interfered with his studies. "My son," says Lady Tichborne, in reply, "never had St. Vitus's dance." When asked if he had not been in the army, he replied, "Yes," but that he did not know much about it, because he had merely enlisted as a private soldier "in the Sixty-sixth Blues," and had been "bought off" by his father after only thirteen days' service. What ship did you leave Europe in? inquired Mr. Gibbes, with a view of sending further tokens of identity to the Dowager. To this inquiry, Roger Tichborne might have been expected to answer in "La Pauline," but, as was shown in the trial, this mysterious person replied, in "The Jessie Miller." "And when did she sail?" "On the 28th of November, 1852," was the reply; whereas Roger sailed on the 1st of March, 1853. Asked as to where he was educated, the long-lost heir replied, "At a school in Southampton," where Roger never was at school. But it happened that Lady Tichborne in a letter to Mr. Gibbes had said that her son was for three years at the Jesuit College of Stonyhurst, in Lancashire; Mr. Gibbes accordingly suggested to the client "in a humble station of life," that his memory was at fault on that point, but the client maintained his ground. "Did she say he had been at Stonyhurst College? If so, it was false;" and, he added, with an oath, "I have a good mind never to go near her again for telling such a story." Yet this strange person was able to confirm the entire story of the tramping sailors. He _had_ embarked in the "Bella," he _had_ been picked up at sea with other survivors in a boat off the coast of Brazil, and it was quite true that he was landed with them in Melbourne. In short, he corroborated the Dowager's long advertisement in every particular; but beyond that he had nothing of the slightest importance to tell which was not absurdly incorrect. His replies, however, were forwarded to the Lady Tichborne, with pressing requests to send £200, then £250, and finally £400, to enable the lost heir to pay his debts--an indispensable condition of his leaving the colony. It is evident that the statements thus reported puzzled the poor lady a little, and she seems to have been unable to account for the lost heir sending his kind remembrance to his "grandpa," because Roger's' paternal grandfather died before he was born; and his grandfather by the mother's side had also died several years before Roger left England, as the young man knew well enough. She was clearly a little surprised to hear that the resuscitated Roger did not understand a word of French, for "my son," she says, "was born in Paris, and spoke French better than English." But yet, with the strange pertinacity which causes people to cling to that which they know to be wrong, and try to force themselves into belief of its truth, she believed in the _bona-fides_ of the claimant for maternal solicitude and the paternal acres. "I fancied," she said in one letter to Gibbes, "that the photographies you sent me are like him, but of course after thirteen years' absence there must have been some difference in the shape, as Roger was very slim; but," she added, "I suppose all those large clothes would make him appear bigger than he is." Again, alluding to the "photographies," she remarks that at least the hand in the portrait is small, and adds, "that peculiar thing has done a good deal with me to make me recognise him. A year and a half was consumed in these tedious hagglings with brokers and agents for the restoration of a lost heir, and during great part of that time the lost heir himself made no sign, but contented himself with begging trifling loans of Gibbes on the strength of his pretensions. Sometimes a pound was the modest request; sometimes more. He had married, and a child was born, and on that occasion he implored for "three pound," plaintively declaring that he was "more like a mannick than a B. of B.K. (supposed to mean a Baronet of British Kingdom) to have a child born in such a hovel." Still the new man wrapped himself in impenetrable secrecy. The Dowager Lady Tichborne complained that while pressed to send everybody money, she was not even allowed to know the whereabouts nor present name of her lost Roger; and she entreated piteously to be allowed to communicate more directly. It was nothing to her that the accounts the pretender had given of Roger's life were wrong in every particular, except where her own advertisement had furnished information. I think she said on this point, "My poor dear Roger confuses everything in his head just as in a dream, and I believe him to be my son, though his statements differ from mine." In the midst of this curious correspondence trouble once more entered the old home at Tichborne. Sir Alfred, the younger brother of Roger, was dead, and the poor half-crazed mother in a solitary lodging in her loved Paris was left more than ever desolate. Widowed and childless, she had nothing now but to brood over her sorrows, and cling to the old dream of the miraculous saving of her eldest born, who, since the terrible hour of shipwreck--now twelve years past--had given no real token of existence. The position of affairs at Tichborne was remarkable, for though there were hopes of an heir to Tichborne, Sir Alfred had left no child. Should the child--unborn, but already fatherless--prove to be a girl, or other mischance befall, there was an end of the old race of Tichborne. The property would then go to collaterals, and the baronetcy must become extinct. It was under the weight of these new sorrows that the Dowager Lady Tichborne wrote pitiable letters to Gibbes, promising money and asking for more particulars; while enclosing at the same time to the man who thus so unaccountably kept himself aloof a letter beginning, "My dear and beloved Roger, I hope you will not refuse to come back to your poor afflicted mother. I have had the great misfortune to lose your poor dear father, and lately I have lost my beloved son Alfred. I am now alone in this world of sorrow, and I hope you will take that into consideration, and come back." It is hardly surprising that during this time Mr. Gibbes was constantly urging his mysterious client to relinquish his disguise. Why not write to the mother and mention some facts known only to those two which would at once convince her? True, he had already mentioned "facts," which turned out to be fictions, and yet the Dowager's faith was unabated. Mr. Gibbes's client was therefore justified in his answer, that he "did not think it needful." But Gibbes was pressing, for it happened that the Dowager had in one of her letters said, "I shall expect an answer from him. As I know his handwriting, I shall know at once whether it is him." Accordingly we find the Claimant, under the direction of Mr. Gibbes, penning this:--

"WAGGA-WAGGA, _Jan_. 17 66.
MY DEAR MOTHER,--The delay which has taken place since my
last Letter Dated 22d April 54 Makes it very difficult to
Commence this Letter. I deeply regret the truble and
anxoiety I must have cause you by not writing before. But
they are known to my Attorney And the more private details I
will keep for your own Ear. Of one thing rest Assured that
although I have been in A humble conditoin of Life I have
never let any act disgrace you or my Family. I have been A
poor Man and nothing worse Mr. Gilbes suggest to me as
essential. That I should recall to your Memory things which
can only be known to you and me to convince you of my
Idenitity I dont thing it needful my dear Mother, although I
sind them Mamely the Brown Mark on my side. And the Card
Case at Brighton. I can assure you My Dear Mother I have
keep your promice ever since. In writing to me please
enclose your letter to Mr. Gilbes to prevent unnesersery
enquiry as I do not wish any person to know me in this
Country. When I take my proper prosition and title. Having
therefore mad up my mind to return and face the Sea once
more I must request to send me the Means of doing so and
paying a fue outstranding debts. I would return by the
overland Mail. The passage Money and other expences would be
over two Hundred pound, for I propose Sailing from Victoria
not this colonly And to Sail from Melbourne in my own Name.
Now to annable me to do this my dear Mother you must send
me"--

The half-sheet is torn off at this point, but it has been stated by Lady Tichborne's solicitor, who saw it when complete, that the ending originally contained the words "How's Grandma?" This must have again puzzled the Dowager, for Roger had no "Grandma" living when he went away. The date "22d April 54" was also incorrect, for the "Bella" sailed on April 20th. But there were other difficulties; Lady Tichborne had never seen, and, what is more, had never heard of any brown mark on her son Roger; she could say nothing about the "card case at Brighton" (which referred, according to Mr. Gibbes, to the Claimant's assertion that he had left England in consequence of having been swindled out of £1500 by Johnny and Harry Broome, prize-fighters, and others at Brighton races); and lastly, the anxious mother could not recognise the handwriting. The Australian correspondent was somewhat disappointed that the mother did not at once acknowledge him as her son. But the Dowager soon declared her unabated faith; sent small sums and then larger, and finally made up her mind to forward the four hundred pounds. Meanwhile she sent to him, as well as to her other Australian correspondents, much family information. Among other things she told him that there was a man named Guilfoyle at Sydney, who had been gardener for many years at Upton and Tichborne, and another man in the same town named Andrew Bogle, a black man, who had been in the service of Sir Edward. Mr. Gibbes's client lost no time in finding out both these persons, and soon became pretty well primed. It was shortly after this period that it became known in Victoria and New South Wales that there was a man named Thomas Castro, living in Wagga-Wagga as a journeyman slaughter-man and butcher, who was going to England to lay claim to the baronetcy and estates of Tichborne. From the letters and other facts it is manifest that it was originally intended to keep all this secret even from the Dowager. "He wishes," says his attorney, Mr. Gibbes, "that his present identity should be totally disconnected from his future." It happened that one Cator, a Wagga-Wagga friend of the Claimant, whose letters show him to have been a coarse-minded and illiterate man, was leaving for England shortly before the time that Castro had determined to embark. Whether invited or not Cator was not unlikely to favour his friend with a visit in the new and flourishing condition which appeared to await him in that country. Perhaps to make a virtue of necessity, Castro gave to Cator a sealed envelope, bearing outside the words, "To be open when at sea," and inside a note which ran as follows:--

"WAGGA-WAGGA, _April 2nd_, 1866.
Mr. Cater,--At any time wen you are in England you should
feel enclined for a month pleasure Go to Tichborne, in
Hampshire, Enquire for Sir Roger Charles Tichborne,
Tichborne-hall, Tichborne, And you will find One that will
make you a welcome guest. But on no account Mension the Name
of Castro or Alude to me being a Married Man, or that I have
being has a Butcher. You will understand me, I have no
doubt. Yours truely, Thomas Castro. I Sail by the June
Mail."

All this secrecy, however, was soon given up as impracticable for articles in the Melbourne, Wagga-Wagga, and Sydney journals, quickly brought the news to England, and finally Castro determined to take with him his wife and family. One of his earliest steps was to take into his service the old black man Bogle, and pay the passage-money both of himself and his son to Europe with him. Certain relics of Upton and of Tichborne which the Claimant forwarded to a banker at Wagga-Wagga from whom he was trying to obtain advances, were described by the Claimant himself as brought over by "my uncle Valet who is now living with me." The bankers, however, were cautious; and "declined to make loans." Nevertheless, the Claimant had the good fortune to convince a Mr. Long, who was in Sydney, and had seen Roger "when a boy of ten years old riding in Tichborne Park," and accordingly this gentleman advanced him a considerable sum. Finally the Claimant embarked aboard the "Rakaia," on his way to France _viâ_ Panama, and accompanied by his family, and attended by old Bogle, his son, and a youthful secretary, left Sydney on September 2d, 1866, and was expected by the Dowager in Paris within two months from that date. But nearly four months elapsed, and there were no tidings. Between Christmas day and New Year's eve of 1866, there arrived in Alresford a mysterious stranger, who put up at the Swan Hotel in that little town, and said that his name was Taylor. He was a man of bulk and eccentric attire. He wrapped himself in large greatcoats, muffled his neck and chin in thick shawls, and wore a cap with a peak of unusual dimensions, which, when it was pulled down, covered a considerable portion of his features. The stranger, at first very reserved, soon showed signs of coming out of his shell. He sent for Rous, the landlord, and had a chat with him, in the course of which he asked Rous to take him the next day for a drive round the neighbourhood of Tichborne. Rous complied, and the innkeeper, chatting all the way on local matters, showed his guest Tichborne village, Tichborne park and house, the church, the mill, the village of Cheriton, and all else that was worth seeing in that neighbourhood. In fact, Mr. Taylor became very friendly with Rous, invited him to drink in his room, and then confided to him an important secret--which, however, was by this time no secret at all, for Mr. Rous had just observed upon his guest's portmanteau the initials "R.C.T." Indeed it was already suspected in the smoking-room of the Swan that the enormous stranger was the long-expected heir. Suspicion became certainty when the stranger telegraphed for Bogle, and that faithful black, once familiar in the streets of Alresford, suddenly made his appearance there, began reconnoitring the house at Tichborne, contrived to get inside the old home, to learn that it had been let by the trustees of the infant baronet to a gentleman named Lushington, and to examine carefully the position of the old and new pictures hanging on the walls. This done, the stranger and his black attendant disappeared as suddenly as they had come. But the news spread abroad, and reached many persons who were interested. Roger's numerous aunts, uncles, and cousins heard of the sudden appearance of the long-expected Australian claimant. The Dowager in Paris, the mother of the infant, then at Ryde, all heard the news; and finally Mr. Gosford, Roger's dearest and most intimate friend and confidant, then in North Wales, got intelligence, and hastened to London to ascertain if the joyful news could be true.

But the enormous individual had vanished again. The circumstance was strange. Bogle had written letters from Australia declaring that this was the identical gentleman he had known years before as Mr. Roger Tichborne when a visitor at Sir Edward's; and the Dowager had declared herself satisfied. But why did the long-lost Roger hold aloof? No one could tell. There was no reason for such conduct, and so suspicion was engendered. With infinite pains Mr. Gosford and a gentleman connected with the Tichborne family ascertained that the person who had figured as Mr. Taylor at the Swan had taken apartments for himself and his family at a hotel near Manchester Square, and that he had even been there since Christmas day. But once more the clue was lost. Sir Roger Tichborne had gone away with his wife and children, and left no one there but Bogle and his secretary. Then by chance Mr. Gosford discovered that "Sir Roger" was staying at the Clarendon Hotel, Gravesend. Forthwith Mr. Gosford, with the gentleman referred to, and Mr. Cullington, the solicitor, went to the Clarendon Hotel at Gravesend, where, after long waiting in the hall, they saw a stout person muffled, and wearing a peaked cap over the eyes, who, having glanced at the party suspiciously, rushed past them, hurried upstairs, and locked himself in a room. In vain the party sent up cards, in vain they followed and tapped at the door. The stout person would not open, and the party descended to the coffee-room, where soon afterwards they received a mysterious note, concluding:--"pardon me gentlemen but I did not wish any-one to know where I was staying with my family. And was much annoyed to see you all here." Lady Tichborne herself had failed to recognise in the letters from Wagga-Wagga the handwriting of her son, and Mr. Gosford was equally unsuccessful. The party therefore left the house after warning the landlord that he had for a guest an "impostor and a rogue." Still the idea that his old friend, who had made him his executor and the depositary of his most secret wishes, could have come back again alive, however changed, was too pleasing to be abandoned by Mr. Gosford, even on such evidence. Accordingly, by arrangement with an attorney named Holmes, he went down again, and, more successful this time, had conversation with the stranger who called himself Roger. But nothing about the features of the man brought back to him any recollection, and subsequent interviews but confirmed the first impression.

Meanwhile, Lady Tichborne had learned that he whom she called Roger had arrived in England; and she wrote letters imploring him to come to her, to which the Claimant, who had not been in London more than a fortnight, answered, that he was "prevented by circumstances!" and added, "Oh! Do come over and see me at once." On the very day after the date of this letter, however, he arrived in Paris, accompanied by a man whose acquaintance he had made in a billiard room, and by Mr. Holmes, the attorney to whom his casual acquaintance had introduced him. The party put up at an hotel in the Rue St. Honoré. They knew Lady Tichborne's address in the Place de la Madeleine, scarcely five minutes' walk from their hotel; but they had arrived somewhat late, and "Sir Roger" paid no visit to his mother that day. Lady Tichborne had in the meantime consulted her brother and others on the subject, but though the opinions given by them were adverse to the claims of the impostor, she only became more fixed in her ideas. Early the morning after the Claimant's arrival, she sent her Irish servant, John Coyne, to the hotel in the Rue St. Honoré with a pressing message, but was told that "Sir Roger" was not well; his mistress, dissatisfied with that message, sent him again, whereupon "Sir Roger" came out of his bedroom and walked past him "slowly and with his head down," bidding him at the same time go and tell his mamma that he was not able to come to her; and his mistress, still more dissatisfied, then directed her servant "to take a cab immediately and fetch her son." Coyne then went a third time and found "Sir Roger" with his attorney and his casual acquaintance sitting at breakfast, but was again unsuccessful. Lady Tichborne that afternoon went herself to the hotel, and was then permitted to see her son in a darkened chamber, and in the presence of his attorney and friend. "Sir Roger," said Coyne, who tells the story, "was lying on the bed with his back turned to us and his face to the wall," and he added that while he was in that position, his mistress leaned over and kissed Sir Roger on the mouth, observing at the same time that "he looked like his father, though his ears were like his uncle's." Then "Sir Roger" having remarked that he was "nearly stifled," Lady Tichborne directed Coyne to "take off her son's coat and undo his braces;" which duties the faithful domestic accomplished with some difficulty, while at the same time he "managed to pull him over as well as he could." Upon this Mr. Holmes, solemnly standing up, addressed John Coyne in the words: "You are a witness that Lady Tichborne recognises her son," and John Coyne having replied, "And so are you," the ceremony of recognition was complete.

Soon after this it was rumoured in the neighbourhood of Alresford, that the Dowager Lady Tichborne had acknowledged the stranger as her lost son Roger; that she had determined to allow the repentant wanderer £1000 a year; and that he was going to take a house at Croydon pending his entering into the possession of the Tichborne estates. There happened then to be living in Alresford a gentleman named Hopkins. He had been solicitor to the Tichborne family, but they had long ceased to employ him. He had also been a trustee of the Doughty estates, but had been compelled to resign that position, at which he had expressed much chagrin. Hopkins had an acquaintance named Baignet at Winchester, an eccentric person of an inquisitive turn. Both these began at this time to busy themselves greatly in the matter of the Tichborne Claimant, who, on his next visit to Alresford, was accordingly invited to stay at Mr. Hopkins's house. From that time Mr. Hopkins and Mr. Baignet became active partisans of the Claimant's cause. Hopkins had not been the solicitor of Roger Tichborne, but he had seen him occasionally from fifteen to twenty years previously; and he made an affidavit, that "though he could not recall the expression of Roger Tichborne's features," he had no doubt, from the knowledge which the Claimant had shown of the neighbourhood of Tichborne and of family matters, that he was the same person. All Alresford may, in fact, be said to have been converted; the bells were rung on the Claimant's arrival there; and Colonel Lushington, the tenant of Tichborne house, invited the Australian stranger and his wife to stay with him there. Colonel Lushington had never seen Roger Tichborne, but he has explained that he was impressed by his visitor's knowledge of the old pictures on the walls, which, it will be remembered, Bogle had been sent by "Mr. Taylor" to reconnoitre. When the news came that "Sir Roger's wife," on a visit with her husband to Col. Lushington, had had a child baptised in the chapel at Tichborne, while Mr. Anthony Biddulph, another convert, and a remote connection of the Tichborne family, had become godfather, the bells of Alresford rang louder; and nobody seemed for a moment to doubt the right of the Claimant to the estates and title. Still it was felt strange that "Sir Roger" went near none of his old friends. He had left Paris without an effort to see his former circle of acquaintances. Chatillon, his early tutor, had been brought by the Dowager there to see him; but Chatillon had said, "Madame, this is not your son!" Neither the Abbé Salis, nor Roger's dear old instructor, Father Lefevre, nor Gossein, the faithful valet, who had played with him from childhood, and had known him well as a man, nor, indeed, any person in Paris who had been acquainted with Roger Tichborne, received a visit. In England the facts were the same. The stranger would go nowhere, and at last it began to be believed that he was afraid of detection.

Active measures were meanwhile in preparation for those legal proceedings which have, within the past three years, occupied so large a share of public attention. Mr. Holmes and many others were busy in procuring information. The voluminous will of Roger Tichborne, setting forth a mass of particulars about the family property, was examined at Doctors' Commons. Then there were records of proceedings in the Probate Court and in Chancery relating to the Tichborne estates, of which copies were procured. The Horse Guards furnished the indefatigable attorney with minute and precise statements of the movements of the Carabineers during Roger Tichborne's service, and of the dates of every leave of absence and return. Then the Dowager's attorney procured from Stonyhurst lists of the professors and officials during Roger's three years' study there; and finally, the books of Lloyd's and the "Merchant Seamen's Register" were searched for information about the movements of the "Pauline," the "Bella," and other vessels. Coincident with these researches, there was a marked improvement in the Claimant's knowledge of the circumstances of what he alleged to be his own past life. There was no mention now of "the Sixty-sixth Blues," or of having been a private soldier; no denial, with or without an oath, of having been at Stonyhurst; no allusion to any other of the numerous statements he had made to Mr. Gibbes on those points. Then converts began to multiply, but not among the Tichborne family, or in any other circle that had known Roger very intimately. Affidavits, however, increased in number. People related wonderful instances of things the Claimant reminded them of, and which had happened in the past. On the one hand, these facts were regarded as "genuine efforts of memory;" on the other, they were stigmatised as the result of an organized system of extracting information from one person, and playing it off upon another.

At the end of July 1867, there was a public examination of the Claimant in Chancery, at which, for the first time, he made generally known that famous account of his alleged wreck and--escape in one of the boats of the "Bella," with eight other persons, which, with some variations, he has since maintained. It was then that, in answer to questions, he stated that he was not certain of the name of the vessel that picked him up, but was "under the impression that it was the 'Osprey.'" He also said that her captain's name was "Owen Lewis, or Lewis Owen," but he was "not certain," though he said that three months elapsed between the date of his being saved and his being landed in Melbourne in July 1854. Besides these, the most remarkable points in his examination were his statements that, on the very next day after his arrival, he was engaged by a Mr. William Foster, of Boisdale, an extensive farmer in Gippsland, to look after cattle; and that he henceforward lived in obscurity in Australia under the name of Thomas Castro. The name of Thomas Castro, he added, had occurred to him because, during his travels in South America, he had known a person so named at Melipilla, in Chili.

Mr. Gosford was also examined on that occasion, with results which had an important influence on the progress of the great _cause célèbre_. Some time before that gentleman had been induced to have one more interview with the Claimant in the presence of two of his most influential supporters, who thereupon requested Mr. Gosford to test their _protégé_ by asking him about some private matter between him and his friend Roger in the past. Thus challenged Mr. Gosford naturally bethought him of the sealed paper, in which Roger had recorded his intention of building a chapel or church at Tichborne, and dedicating it to the Virgin, in the event of his marrying his cousin within three years; and he therefore requested the Claimant to declare, if he could, what were the contents of a certain packet marked "private" which Roger left in his hands when he went away. Having obtained no definite answer, Mr. Gosford, for the sake of fairness, went a step further, and said that it recorded an intention "to carry out an arrangement at Tichborne in the event of his marrying a certain lady." Still there was no answer; and thereupon Mr. Gosford, declaring that the whole interview "was idle," left the place. That packet, unfortunately, was no longer in existence. Some years after Roger Tichborne's death appeared to be beyond all doubt, Mr. Gosford had simply burnt it, regarding it as a document which it would be useless, and which he had no right, to keep, and yet one which, on the other hand, he should not be justified in giving up to any living person. The fact of its being burnt he had for obvious reasons concealed, but being now asked on the subject he was compelled to state the circumstance. It is remarkable that, on the very morrow of that disclosure, the Claimant for the first time made a statement to his supporter, Mr. Bulpett, as to the packet. It may be supposed that Mr. Bulpett and the Claimant's friends generally were inclined to draw unfavourable inferences from his apparent ignorance of the contents of the packet. He now, however, declared that not ignorance of its contents, but delicacy and forbearance towards Mrs. Radcliffe, had alone prevented his answering Mr. Gosford's test question. Mr. Gosford, he said, was right. It did relate to "an arrangement to be carried out at Tichborne," but an arrangement of a very painful kind. Then it was that he wrote out the terrible charge against the lady whom Roger had loved so well--confessing, it is true, his own diabolical wickedness, but at the same time casting upon her the cruellest of imputations. This, he said, was what he had sealed up and given to Mr. Gosford. Mr. Bulpett, the banker, put his initials solemnly to the document, and within a few months all Hampshire had whispered the wicked story. It is to be observed that, during all this time, no word had been spoken by the Claimant of his having confided to Mr. Gosford a vow to build a church. Four years later, when under examination, he was asked whether he had ever left any other private document with Mr. Gosford, and he answered, "I think not." Then it was that counsel produced the copy of the vow to build the church in Roger Tichborne's hand, which he had fortunately given to his cousin on the sorrowful day of their last parting; and finally there was found and read aloud the letter of Roger Tichborne to Mr. Gosford, dated January 17th, 1852, in which occur the precious words, "I have written out my will, and left it with Mr. Slaughter; the only thing which I have left out is about the church, which I will only build under the circumstances which I have left with you in writing." Happily these facts render it unnecessary to enter upon the question, Whether this story was not wholly irreconcilable, both with itself and with the ascertained dates and facts in Roger Tichborne's career?