dear Mrs. Fitzhammond. What shall I do? I must buy you another monkey, but where shall I find such a divine monkey? I shall never be able to afford it if I do find it. I must try and

buy it." The

persuade Lady Glassington to good-natured Mrs. Fitzhammond begged her not to distress herself, and ringing the bell, very quietly, desired the attendant to clear away the vestiges of her misfortune.

Lady Glassington, meanwhile, gravely rebuked Mrs. Neville. "You know, my dear Mrs. Neville, you should never touch any thing: I have told you so a thousand times. I wonder you do not learn better manners, since we have lived a good deal together, and I have been indefatigable in teaching you. I wonder you have not at least learnt to know that you break every thing you come near."

Well, I'm sure I do think I'm the most unfortunate !-thank you, Lady Emily." (Emily was endeavouring to disengage her flounces from the carved work of a gilt chair;) "I don't know how it is, my flounces are always catching in something or other-but don't scold, Lady Glassington, it is not your monkey, you know,

a

that is broken, and Mrs. Fitzhammond is 'Mistress of herself though china fall,' so goodhumoured, só serene. Well! to be sure, it is beyond belief."

The double doors now flew open, and the Duke of Godolphin came in with his daughter, Lady Arabella Courtney, his eldest son, the Marquis of Bellamont, and a fashionable hanger on of the latter, already known in these pages as Captain Lepel.

The Duke was a man of magnificent stature and appearance, covered with honours and orders. Lady Arabella and Lord Bellamont were both handsome. Lady Frances, to whom their appearance was perfectly unexpected, absolutely half rose from her chair with astonishment; and she and Lady Arabella accosted each other with the measured tokens of mutual recognition, which it is allowable to fashionables to express.

The Duke approached Mrs. Fitzhammond with stately courtesy ; but before he could get half through the compliments he had prepared for the occasion, he was interrupted by Mrs. Fitzhammond's entreating him to sit down, and pushing half a dozen chairs across his toes, which

his Grace dexterously evaded by stepping aside, and declaring he had rather stand. Then having made a slight bow to the company, he placed his back against the wall, near the fireplace; and while his host stood on tip-toe to reach his ear, the grandee himself cast an eye around to ascertain that there was nothing so great or so powerful in the room as himself; and having ascertained that fact, a smiling air of complacency overspread his features, and he whispered to the delighted Mr. Fitzhammond till dinner was announced,

CHAPTER II.

We meet! but not as once we met;
Our better days are o'er,
And dearly as I prize thee yet,

I cannot love thee more:

My young and precious hopes were wept
With many a tear away,

And since thy faith so long has slept,

It wakes too late to-day!

T. K, HERVEY.

THE company paired off according to Heraldic laws. Mr. Fitzhammond handed down Lady Arabella Courtney; the Countess of Glassington followed on the arm of Lord Bellamont, while Lord Mowbray hung a little back; Mr. Carlton stepped forward and offered his arm to Lady Frances; Lady Emily, of course, fell to Lord Mowbray; and the remainder of the party followed as near to the prescribed forms of precedency, as the arrangements of the moment permitted.

The Duke of Godolphin secured to himself the c 5

honour of conducting Mrs. Fitzhammond to the dining-room, where the parties became happily approximated in the manner most agreeable to their respective tastes.

Lady Emily found herself between Lord Mowbray and Colonel Pennington. Lady Frances was pleased to have Lord Bellamont on one side and Mr. Carlton on the other. While, within reach of the dumb-show peculiar to the caste to which they devoted themselves, and on the opposite side, sat Lady Arabella, with whom Lady Frances continued an intelligence throughout the dinner relative to all that was passing obnoxious to their ideas of ton. The favoured gentlemen of their suite, the initiated in this freemasonry of impertinence, were participators in the scene; and while the really well-bred part of the company felt distressed at the suppressed laughter and rude whispers which passed from one to the other, the unfortunate relatives of the house, persons, in fact, infinitely superior to those who scorned them, and whom Mrs. Fitzhammond had the good sense and the good feeling never to exclude, even at the risk of having a mixed company, sat abashed and mortified by fashionable folly. In the midst of