him into a belief that if his body was supine, his mind, at least, was active.

When young, Sir William mixed much with the world, and seemed fond of society; but since his marriage, finding, probably, that the hospitalities of life entailed upon him greater exertion than during the unshackled period of his celibacy, or that time had deprived society of its zest, he became a stout supporter of seclusion, discontinued from time to time the expected calls and invitations which civility demanded towards his neighbours, till friend after friend dropped off, and he found himself at the expiration of twenty years, in the centre of a large and hospitable neighbourhood, almost in a state of solitude.

This

Meanwhile, there was one passion which, though generally of too turbulent a nature to be the companion of indolence, had attained a rapid growth, and been fostered by this very seclusion. passion was pride. Mixing little with his equals and superiors, and communing chiefly with his own mind, or with his inferiors in age, talent, or station, what wonder if he became inflated with a high sense of his own importance? Mortifications also reached him. He could not but be sensible that the world which he had long neglected, had in return neglected him. He endeavoured to feel the proud contempt of injured merit, to think how much happier he was in himself, than the vain pleasures of society could make him, and to "dash the world aside, and bid it pass."

Of

But these efforts were generally fruitless. ten of late, would he sigh for civilities, which he had once denounced as troublesome, and long to resume that station, which, when once lost, was not easily regained. Besides, he felt that the first step must now be made by him, and this step he

scorned to take; and pride rivetted those chains which indolence had first imposed. Thus, though naturally a good-natured, easy, cheerful man, he became testy and irascible, tenderly suspicious of neglect and insult, and ready to trace in the most innocent conduct of his neighbours a disposition to affront him.

Lady Lacy was a well disposed woman, of weak judgment and strong prejudices. Her chief defect, was a love of petty mystery, through which she frequently magnified trifles, and sometimes produced misunderstandings, which she had not the ability to repair. She was an excessive wonderer at nothings, and though with scarce sufficient discernment to protect her from the most obvious snare, though herself shrewd and politic, and could generally discover deep and hidden motives for the simplest actions. Bating a little prying love of scandal, she took a charitable pleasure in the welfare of her neighbours, and was unimpeachable in her exercise of the important duties of wife and mother.

Sir William and Lady Lacy had only one son and one daughter, of whom the latter was married, much to the satisfaction of her parents, to Mr. Hartley, a young man of good fortune in that neighbourhood. Mrs. Hartley was in most respect the converse of her mother, quick and intelligent, somewhat decisive in her tone, and masculine in her modes of thinking. She was handsome, elegant, and well-bred, and nothing was requisite but a slight diminution of coldness and bluntness, to make her at all times very agreeable.

Herbert Lacy differed from his parents in many respects, as widely as his sister did. To all the intelligence and literary taste of Sir William Lacy, he added the mental vigour and physical activity

which his father wanted. He was rapid, perhaps hasty, in his judgments; but he had a mind which eagerly sought conviction, and never cherished with puny partiality, a preconceived opinion, or feared to retract an erroneous assertion. He was generous, open, unsuspicious, lively, and enterprising, somewhat fickle in his pursuits, but ardent in the furtherance of them. He was perhaps rather too much dazzled with the specious lustre of versatile accomplishments, and ambitious of the reputation of knowing a little of every thing; a reputation which most of his acquaintance were ready to grant him. His manners were agreeable, and his conversation varied and amusing.

His father's seclusion had not influenced Herbert's habits; and, considering his youth, he had been a good deal seen in the world, and had a tolerably extensive acquaintance with the best society. He had nicely honourable feelings, some pride of birth, a good deal of fastidiousness, and a disposition to hauteur, towards those whom he disliked. His habits were naturally sociable, and he had just that proper proportion of vanity, which creates in some degree the "besoin de succès," and prompts its possessor to put in requisition his powers of pleasing. He saw with pain, the indolent seclusion to which his father had doomed himself, and lamented it the more when he perceived its unhappy effect upon his mind, in producing a feeling of morbid pride, to which he would otherwise have been a stranger. At first, he was disposed to think, that there was little cause for this irritable dread of neglect, and doubted not that his father still maintained his proper station in the estimation of his neighbours. But a county meeting, to which Sir William, with some difficulty, consented to accompany his son, tended to alter this opinion. Her

bert Lacy then perceived to his sorrow, that, though some outward civility was displayed towards his father, there were few indications of friendship or respect. He was viewed by his neighbours, as one who has awakened from a long trance, and could neither know nor care much, concerning any subject in which they felt most interested.

Many did not know him, and few that did were cordial in their manner. They made punctilious inquiries after Lady Lacy; and then the speakers would turn away, as if they had discharged their duty, and enter into cheerful converse with those with whom they had broken bread, and mixed in active scenes and useful labours that afforded subjects of mutual interest. Herbert saw that these demonstrations of indifference, were not lost upon his father, and that, in spite of his assumed cheerfulness, they mortified him deeply. He sincerely hoped that wounded pride would urge him to regain that consideration to which but for his own besetting sin, he was so justly entitled: but alas! it operated to his disadvantage, as such a passion always does; and with grief, did Herbert hear him denounce his neighbours, as a tiresome set of senseless boors; ridicule with no inconsiderable humour the objects and conduct of the meeting, and profess his resolution, never again to subject himself to the useless penance of herding with such a band of uncongenial spirits.

Encountered, as Sir William Lacy was, on almost every side, with the just retaliation of neglect, it is creditable to state, that there was but one family whom he regarded with any feeling of enmity. The head of this obnoxious house was Mr. Morton, a gentleman as little resembling him in his modes of life as in dignity of descent. Mr.

Morton's father, a man of mean extraction, had accumulated a considerable fortune in the iron trade, and having appropriated a large part of it to the purchase of the Dodswell estate, property situated not far from Lacy Park, had early endeavoured to sink the manufacturer in the country gentleman; and being ambitious of securing to his son those advantages in which he himself was deficient, spared no expense in his education, pushed him onward into the polite world, and urged him to cultivate the society of persons of rank, and if possible to ennoble his escutcheon by a dignified alliance. All this his son, the present Mr. Morton, succeeded in performing; for he soon got into possession of a large and fashionable acquaintance, and eventually married Lady Louisa Eustace, daughter of the Duke of Swansea.

Mr. Morton was a man of gentlemanly manners and prepossessing appearance. To education and society he owed much; but Nature, which does not always disdain to bestow the most aristocratic distinctions of face and figure, on those whose claims cannot be ratified by the Herald's College, had been highly liberal to Mr. Morton; and he certainly bore, in a remarkable degree, that subtle, indefinable grace, which bespeaks at once the gentleman. To this he chiefly owed his success, for though a man of pleasure, he was not strictly one of gaiety, and though from a knowledge of the world, and a consequent fund of anecdote, he was tolerably pleasing, he never contributed much to the entertainment of any one, or could justly receive other than the undistinguishing praise of good-breeding. His talents were, perhaps, rather above than below mediocrity; but he had never been urgently called upon to exert them, and they were, therefore, less efficient than they might have