"I can think nothing vulgar," returned Fawknor, (looking round him at the family pictures with an air of somewhat stiff politeness), "in a gentleman so well descended."

"Why, yes!" replied our host, "a good descent is, in my creed, sometimes a good thing, especially as it gives one but very little trouble. It is, in these equalizing days, rather rudely treated; but if it only kept one from shabby thoughts and shabby actions, I, for one, would ever uphold it. There," said he, turning to one of his kinsmen of the house of Douglas, an officer in a naval uniform, with a ship on fire in the back-ground, "what Douglas would prove recreant, if it were possible for any of that gallant name to think of being so, when he remembered his ancestor at Chatham, who, when his ship was on fire, exclaimed, 'a Douglas never was known to quit his post!' and chose rather to be blown up, as you see, though he might have escaped."

Fawknor could not help approving this unexpected remark; for unexpected it was; but he could not at the same time conceal a look of surprise, though checked by that repose of good breeding which proscribes all display of astonishment, let what will be the cause.

Blythfield, who, under his plain and rather blunt manner, possessed, as we have seen, a great deal of shrewdness, noticed this.

"What!" said he, "I suppose your and my friend Lady Grandborough has told you that I am a bear, and a plebeian, because I wear this old-fashioned coat, and like my old-fashioned life at Welbourne, better than hers at Grandborough. But I often tell her (and she does not like me the better for it), that I am the old courtier of the Queen, who, like a wise man, keep myself within my own bounds;' she

"A new fangled Lady that is dainty, nice, and spare,

Who never knew what belonged to good housekeeping or care,
Whose new fashioned hall built where the old one stood,

Is hung with new pictures that do the poor no good,

And fine marble chimneys wherein burns neither coal nor wood."*

* Old and young Courtier.

This allusion to his misfortunes in his cold visit to Grandborough, so feelingly described a day or two before, amused me, and I accused him of bearing malice; to which he assented. But Fawknor thinking it right to defend his puissant ally, could not see how Lady Grandborough was to blame for living, like other ladies of her quality; and that, for one, he must be permitted both to approve and admire her tastes.

"My dear Sir," replied Blythfield, eying him with something of caustic scrutiny, "approve and admire her and her tastes as much as you please. Do not suppose that I blame my Lady cousin for the life she leads, or the manner in which she spends her husband's money. If she choose to lie a-bed all day, instead of only till twelve o'clock; or, being herself a mushroom, resolve to visit nobody under the wife of a Knight of the Garter; or have twenty poodle dogs instead of one, for her companions; if that is her happiness, I cannot be so silly or so impertinent as to blame her. Only give me leave in my turn, to live the life I like, and avoid what I dislike, though others may find hers a heaven.”

"Certainly," said Fawknor, looking a little disconcerted, but soon resuming his tone, "every one has a right to his tastes, however they many differ, and whether high or low; the question is as to the nature of those tastes."

Here he stopped, thinking he had said enough.

"But with all possible deference to your refinement," returned Blythfield, "that can never be the question; for no one can ever by argument fix a taste, or force a man to like or dislike any thing he is not inclined to like or dislike. All I contend for is the power of being a quiz, if I please, without being laughed at; or, if am, to have liberty to laugh in my turn at those I think greater quizzes than myself. The truth is, there can be no superiority of one man over another, in any thing, merely conventional, unless he belong to the same clique, and acknowledge the same laws, customs, and sovereigns. Lady Grandborough has, I know, said, that I like to live among blackguards, and I, with as much reason, assert that her Ladyship likes to live among

fools; but I mean not by this, what I know not to be true, that all her Ladyship's friends are fools, or that all ladies of quality are Lady Grandboroughs."

"Both would be wrong," I observed, fearing a breach of the peace; for I saw something like incipient contempt and indisposition kindling in Fawknor, and certainly no inclination in mine host to yield to his fine visitor.

We had now left the dining-room, and a well appointed, well painted Bath coach came rattling by, loaded inside and out, to its fullest capacity; but its four superb horses, their skins dazzling with sleekness and good grooming, made nothing of it, and it absolutely smoked along the road with very little exertion. They gave nothing but pleasure to the blooming coachman, and evidently delighted a dozen of jolly outsides. Observing we were at the windows, coachey pulled off his hat with great reverence, which was returned by Blythfield with a (sotto voce, as if to himself,) "How are you, Matt.?" This was not unobserved by Fawknor, nor was the impression it made upon him lost upon Blythfield-who said to him, "I see all you think of me for this unseemly condescension,-which would banish me for ever from the Squares of London; but you would not, I am sure, cut an old friend.”

Fawknor rather reddened at the surmise. "You do not, perhaps, know, that I too am a brother of the whip, and have sometimes driven that very coach, with that very Matt. for my instructor, who, therefore, salutes the house whenever he passes, whether I am at the window or not. You see, too, what a gay thing the whole is; how many happy faces were enjoying their jolly trip, in the buxom air, with pleasant fields on each side, to say nothing of those glorious animals who seemed themselves to participate in the cheerfulness, and certainly, though so loaded, gave no sign of ennui."

66

1 never thought any body could be so eloquent," said I, "upon a stage-coach, and wonder less than ever at the sign I so frequently see, of the coach and horses; still less now, at your taste for a house so near the road.

Yet I should think dust and noise might incommode you enough to make you sometimes wish for the retirement you so dislike in a park."

Fawknor observed he was just going to make the same remark.

"As to the dust," replied he, "you saw none just now; and if you will examine, you will find the whole road watered like a summer garden. Noise, indeed, is not always agreeable; yet that which indicates the cheerfulness of the heart,-those brats for instance, now running home from their evening school,-I can manage to bear; nay, if I have been a long time alone, can find pleasure in it; but if not, it is only shifting my quarters to another room, where a garden and quiet are ready to greet me."

To this I replied, "You have studied the matter, I see, and I have no more to say; but it should seem from your own account, that company now and then is a treat."

"You are perfectly right," he replied; "and the pleasure yours give me, at this moment, proves it."

This was so well timed, and accompanied with an air so naturally easy, that Fawknor himself was struck with it, and began to give Blythfield credit for something like innate, though not acquired, suavity of man

ners.

"Thanking you for your politeness," said I, "this visit of ours, you know, was merely accidental; and I should fear, with all your taste for simple life and manners, a companion of your own calibre would only do good. I should be glad to know your secret to pass whole days without suitable conversation."

"My secret is very simple," he replied; "for, exclusive of books, I am never at fault for want of company to converse with. I converse with myself, and have often enough, and too much of my subject. I have a thousand evils, and ten thousand weaknesses and imperfections, to probe, sift, understand, and, if possible, correct. Things that one cannot detect in a crowd, strike us forcibly when alone; there is then no diversion from truth, no drawing off of the witnesses against one's self,

no disguise, because no necessity for one; but all naked, unsophisticated reality, cited to, and examined at, the bar of conscience. If to know ourselves, therefore, be the first precept, to be alone in order to do so, is the second."

Both Fawknor and myself were struck with the emphatic and rather raised manner in which he uttered these words, and we both mentally asked the same question-can this be Lady Grandborough's vulgar relation?

"There is a pleasure, however," continued he, "to those accustomed to be alone, not easy to be understood by those who are not, and of which we ourselves are only most sensible when we are interrupted: I mean, when we feel that we are monarchs of all we survey, and have no rivals near the throne, though the throne be only the fireside or the arm-chair. To feel that we may roam at pleasure from one room to another, or up and down the same room, without annoying or being annoyed by anybody; that we may indulge whatever train of thought we please, and even give liberty to that thought by talking to one's self, if one likes it; and all this secure from what infallibly breaks the enchantment-the mere eye, much more the tongue of an intruder, even though a friend. This, I say, is more real enjoyment, though under a fancied monotony, than many a devotee of company is able to conceive. But when you have had your fill of all this, and wander out of doors for a change, every step you take, every breath you breathe, and every face you meet, is fraught with something of pleasantness, which those who live always in a crowd are doomed never to taste."

"Well described," said I; "but these are your mornings. You dine early, and I should fear your evenings hung heavy."

"They pass quicker than the rest of the day," said he, "though I can scarcely to myself tell how. Certainly they pass more imperceptibly than under the restraints of company;-which, let them, or the dinner, be ever so good, I have always wished at an end, and