In the round-faced rosy cherub before him, bearing his eye
and his name, and vindicating a hereditary title to his family affection
and patronage, by means of a tie which Sir Everard held as sacred as
either Garter or Blue Mantle, Providence seemed to have granted to him
the very object best calculated to fill up the void in his hopes and
affections. Sir Everard returned to Waverley Hall upon a led horse which
was kept in readiness for him, while the child and his attendant were
sent home in the carriage to Brere-wood Lodge, with such a message
as opened to Richard Waverley a door of reconciliation with his elder
brother.
Their intercourse, however, though thus renewed, continued to be rather
formal and civil, than partaking of brotherly cordiality; yet it was
sufficient to the wishes of both parties. Sir Everard obtained, in the
frequent society of his little nephew, something on which his hereditary
pride might found the anticipated pleasure of a continuation of his
lineage, and where his kind and gentle affections could at the same
time fully exercise themselves. For Richard Waverley, he beheld in the
growing attachment between the uncle and nephew the means of securing
his son's, if not his own, succession to the hereditary estate, which he
felt would be rather endangered than promoted by any attempt on his own
part towards a closer intimacy with a man of Sir Everard's habits and
opinions.
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