In this new-found El Dorado,
Hillary had, it seems, been a labourer, and, if he
told truth, to some purpose, though he was far
from having completed the harvest which he meditated.
He spoke, indeed, of making investments,
and, as a mere matter of fancy, he consulted his
old master, Clerk Lawford, concerning the purchase
of a moorland farm, of three thousand acres,
for which he would be content to give three or
four thousand guineas, providing the game was
plenty, and the trouting in the brook such as had
been represented by advertisement. But he did
not wish to make any extensive landed purchase
at present. It was necessary to keep up his interest
in Leadenhall Street; and in that view, it
would be impolitic to part with his India stock and
India bonds. In short, it was folly to think of
settling on a poor thousand or twelve hundred
a-year, when one was in the prime of life, and had
no liver complaint; and so he was determined to
double the Cape once again, ere he retired to the
chimney corner of life. All he wished was, to
pick up a few clever fellows for his regiment, or
rather for his own company; and as in all his
travels he had never seen finer fellows than about
Middlemas, he was willing to give them the preference
in completing his levy.
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