variety of fashionable life that has not been presented to

us, and that too by very able hands. We have in our memory every sort of character as exhibited in the upper ranks of this country,—the ex- quisite, the lofty, the pompous, the mischievous, the scandalous, the

amiable, the elegant • those of ancient family, parvenus, upstarts, high-bred and low-bred, the stupid, the accomplished, the virtuous,

the ridiculous ; under all their different phases, and exhibiting in

tvery possible scene,—the Park, Almack's, at the fancy-ball, the villa '1061'171e, the boudoir tete tete, the drawing-room's mild splendour,

the auction, abroad, at home, riding, walking, sailing, electioneer- ing, matchmaking, spending, saving, treating, feasting—in short, pursuing the routine of an English aristocrat poor or rich, detri- mental or available, mortgager or mortgagee, lordling or younger brother.

Of the compounders of this gently stimulating mixture, termed the fashionable novel, one of the pleasantest and the truest is Mrs. GORE, the authoress of Women as They Are, and the new novel of Pin-Money. Her characters are natural, well conceived, and well developed ; her dialogues are amusina, though hardly natural, being too elaborately phrased and sadly tricked out with French; as for her stories, they are not more absurd than those of novels in general. In Women as They Are, she showed the natural results of neglect in the feelings of the wife, and the consequences of a man's giving himself wholly up to public interests and forgetting domestic claims. In Pin-Money she has made out but a poor case. The object is to demonstrate the dangers of an allowance of this kind in fashionable life : it is represented as leading the heroine into all kinds of temptation, to expense, and to the very brink of vice. The authoress wishes to show that the wife ought to depend on her husband for every supply of money in detail, and that this course is the safest and most agreeable. The example of a very amiable woman spending much more than her stipend, is certainly but a poor mode of proving that ladies ought not to have any fixed allowance at all. It would be as easy to show from similar cases, that men ought not to be trusted with their own. incomes ; for the instances are not rare of men spending a vast deal more than they have. Lady Rawleigh—Mrs. GORE'S imaginary paragon led astray by pin-money—having never been taught the value of money, imagines that four hundred per an- num is an illimitable sum, and makes such poor use of her arith- metic that in the course of one year she unwittingly spends a thou- sand. Mrs. GORE might thence have concluded that no young lady should be intrusted with a sovereign until she knew it was worth twenty shillings; the price of an artisan's time for a whole week : in- stead of which, she makes it out that every wife should take her bills to her husband, and request him to settle the same. We do not see how this process is to act as a check; for it is as easy to overrun in bills as in pin-money. Mrs. GORE should have struck at the root of the matter at once, and shown us how very absurdly young women are educated for any other purpose than as man-traps to catch heirs in.

Women as They Are had its Forsyths, a rich mercantile family, attempting to confound themselves with the fashionable aristo- cracy, and getting well laughed at for their pains. There is a pen- dant to them in Pin-Money. The Waddlestones, who live in a pa- lace of art, virtit, and botany, at Kensington Gore, are soap- boilers of immense wealth. Mrs. Waddlestone is a person of ex- treme vulgarity, who is determined that " Leo, her daughter, shall marry nothing under a lord ;" and mixes up boasts of her wealth. with bad French picked up on a Continental tour. Mr. Waddle- stone is only a soap-boiler by connexion with the house ; and is represented as the model of every thing gentlemanly, refined, and even noble in sentiments and manners. Rolling in wealth, patro- nizing the arts, and living in magnificence, he is represented as makine-'' his way into aristocratic society with difficulty, and de- chningthe invitations of a fashionable peer on the ground of proud humility. Is this like the truth ? is wealth held so cheap by the aristocracy ?—to say nothing of refined tastes, a splendid es- tablishment, a first-rate cook, and a beautiful and elegant daughter, with a dowry of a hundred thousand pounds ready money. Mrs. GORKS forte is undoubtedly the conception and delinea- tion of character ; in addition to this, we value her writings for. various scattered remarks on manners, distinguished for their shrewdness and good sense. We could collect from her novels a little volume of pleasant and just remarks on fashionable society.. At present we shall cenfine ourselves to the quotation of a few of her well-drawn characters.

The following is the character of Sir Brooke Rawleigh, a baronet, who is set forth as the hero of the story—and a very poor one he makes.

" Sir Brooke Rawleigh, the willing victim of Lady Olivia Tadcaster's cupidity, was, in truth, a very pleasing, well-looking, gentlemanly young- man, calculated to pass through life with credit to himself, without split- ting the trumpet of fame by the magnitude of his sayings or doings. But all that was wanting in brilliancy of talent was made up by sterling prin- ciples of honour and honesty ; and his abilities were peculiarly adapted to the judicious management of a tolerably extensive landed estate, and to the steady maintenance of those collateral links which unite the proprietor to his county, and his county to the kingdom. His financial. discernment might not have shone in Downing Street, or made a plausible figure on the Treasury-bench ; hut it was sufficient to keep Mr. Ruggs, his steward, within reasonable bounds of peculation, and had more thaa. once attracted the sapient reverence of his brethren of the petty sessions. His eloquence wouldscarcely have suspended the breath of five hundred startled senators, like one of Canning's electrical orations ; or in a seven; hours' process of argument have kept their eyelids unsealed, like a discus- sion by Brougham. Nevertheless it made a very respectable stand at the after-dinner debates of the squirearchy of Ilk neighbourhood ; and his maiden-speech at a county-niecting, on the poor-laws, or the corn-laws, or the anti-slavery or anti-knavery associations, or some of those cut- and-dried themes for full-grown gentlemen,—which, like huge stones upon a hill, are rolled upwards and downwards with succeeding vehicles without a chance of being crushed into the beaten track,—had -found its way into the County Chronicle, well italicized with 'hear, hear !' besides being honoured with ten lines of great-letter eulogy from the pen of the editor.

"Sir Brooke Rawleigh, in short, was gifted with just that measure of intellectual power which is either made or marred by education. A pre- ceptor of strong and elegant abilities might have done wonders with him ;, but his uncle and guardian, Sir Robert, who was something of a humorist, contended that wonders were by no means necessary for a young man whose chief business in life would be the management of his Warwick- shire estate. Instead, therefore, of sending him to a public school, to be- come a classical scholar and universal dunce,—and to a crack college to become a fox-hunter and a man of the world,—he was educated at Rugby and Aberdeen ;—passed his vacations at his uncle's country-seat, under the vigilant superintendence of a neighbouring curate ;—and on attaining his majority, and a very ancient baronetcy, made his first ap- pearance in town with notions rather too narrow for the fashionable clubs, and a coat much too narrow for Almack's. In spite, however, of these demerits and circumscriptions, he was soon discovered to be a very gentlemanly, good-tempered young man ; and in return for the favourable verdict of society, condescended to sacrifice his old-fashioned tailor and old-fashioned ways. After flirting through half a dozen seasons, yachting through as many summers, and dividing the same portion of winters between Paris and Melton, Sir Brooke Rawleigh came to be regarded in the neighbourhood of Rawleighford as a miracle of fashion, a model of manners ; and when, at eight-and twenty, an ox was roasted in honour of his union with Frederica Rawdon, the whole county was of opinion, with Lady Olivia Tadcaster, that it was 'an unexceptionable match ;' and that the new menage would form a very advantageous addi- tion to the neighbourhood at large."

Mr. Lexley, a Parliamentary drudge, and a manager of Parlia- mentary property, is very well described. He persuadt s Sir Brooke Rawleigh to buy a borough. The business is settled at the tette tate dinner, and is thus described.

"Sir Brooke Rawleigh and Mr. Lexley were so unfortunate as to belong to different clubs; and the private residence of the latter was therefore. selectedas the scene of their negotiations. It is not to be supposed that a wholesale and retail dealer in Parliament could have fixed his domicile in any other parish than that of St. Margaret, Westminster ; and Sir Brooke accordingly found himself driven to the entrance of a paved court,—an old-fashioned cul-de-sac, whose heavy architraves of carved wood-work, narrow windows, and ostensible roofing of red tile, formed a melancholy memento of the domestic architecture in vogue during the early days of the Hanoverian succession. A peep into the BirdcageWalk, at the peril of. dislocation,—and the unceasing carillon of St. Margaret's chimes, formed the sole enlivenment of this dingy senatorial retreat.

"A mysterious-looking, middle-aged man, with speckled stockings, powdered hair, and a slight hint of a pig-tail,—who might have been in- discriminately taken for a butler, a clerk, or a secretary,—circumspectly ushered the expected guest into his master's study : with a whispered as- surance that Mr. Lexley would shortly make his appearance, having pro- bably been detained at the House ; and Sir Brooke, as he gazed around the uninviting chamber, could not but feel that he should be very unwil- ling to adopt the habits of life of this active servant of the country, in assuming a similar weight of Parliamentary responsibility. He examined the tall, dark, spider-legged mahogany writing-table,—spotted with much ink, and indented with severe penmanship; the unsightly book-casts filled with vellum-bound folios and buff-leather quartos,—(REPORTS, from Vol. I. to Vol. DXXVIII.)—and a ragged regiment of loose and un connected pamphlets; the chimney-piece graced with two dusty glass girandoles, and a museum of printed and watered circulars, addressed by divers clerkly hands to John Lesley, Esq. M.P.'—till his mind involun- tarily reverted to his snug library at Rawleighford, Morel-and-Seddon- ized into the utmost refinement of literary ease, and musky with Russia leather l—its scattered memoranda collected under the paper-weights of Vulliamy's choicest bronze,—and its artificial light distributed by reading. lamps and shaded candles, such as might have assisted Methuselah or old Parr to decipher a diamond edition without spectacles 1 " After the miserable solitude of a quarter of an hour, passed in a retreat presenting few extraneous attractions to divert the attention of its owner from the dry details to which he saw fit to devote his existence,

a hurried rap announced Mr. Lesley's return ; and having accosted his punctual guest with an incoherent explanation touching the lateness of

the division,—the harassed member alluded to the necessity of washing those hands, the cleanliness of which had been so much lauded by Sir Brooke to Frederica, and rushed up the creaking stairs in his usual flurry of superfluous activity.

" Rawleigh, who was now growing hungry and fractious, was right glad 'when at length he found himself seated opposite to his host at the dinner- table ; with a tureen of very diaphanous mock-turtle, and a dish of flaccid salmon smothered in horse-radish and surrounded by some smelts of the consistency of cuttle-fish, standing between them. As soon as he had in

some degree appeased his appetite with these uninviting provisions,—

'which Mr. Lesley announced to be bachelor's fare,' or pot-luck,' or some other apologetic designation of a filthy dinner,—Sir Brooke, on casting his eyes around him, perceived that a well-stored dumb-waiter was placed near his host, and another within his own reach ; and that no sooner had the mysterious butler placed upon the board two bottles of sherry, a saddle of rancid mutton, a haycock of mashed potatoes, and a tepid salad, than he withdrew from attendance ;—closing the door as charily after him as if either his master or his master's guest were la- bouring under a concussion of the brain. It was evident that he was familiarly trained to the business-like privacy of Mr. Lesley's confidential dinners.

"'And now, my dear Sir, we are alone!' said Lesley, in an opening phrase ; twisting, as he spoke, his long throat over his shoulder, like that

of an ill-trussed ptarmigan, to ascertain that his cup-bearer had left the room. Unconsciously the awe-struck baronet followed his scrutinizing glance, and began to feel that there was something inexpressibly awful in all these mysterious preparations for secrecy. Nothing was wanting but Miss Kelly, to render the scene a perfect melodrame !

"It is to be hoped that the courteous reader of these memoirs has formed no expectation of hearing what it was that Mr. Lesley thought fit to utter, when he found himself 'alone' with his friend, Sir Brooke, and the two dumb

waiters. The mysteries of Isis are not more rigidly sacred in our sight, than those occasionally transacted in the parish of St. Margaret ; and if the process which sufficed to render our estimable Rawleigh sole repre- sentative of the respectable borough of Martwich should ever chance to be betrayed to posterity, so indiscreet a revelation shall never be traced to our pages. We prefer adjourning from Mr. Lesley's second course to the dinner in Charles Street."

Mr. Broughley, a member of the Travellers', is thus slightly but cleverly hit off.

"Mr. Broughley was a learned pundit and travelled man ;—had seen not only the Louvre'—(which he appeared to consider as cockneyfied a mo- nument as Aldgate pump)—but the domes of Mecca, and the Senate House of Washington ;—had assisted at a storthing at Drontheim—a diet at Pesth ;—palavered with the Dog-ribbed Indians, and sat face to face with the mummy of Moops, by the light of one of Davy's safety-lamps, in the Great Pyramid. This active member—not of society—but of all the the societies of modern Europe, was one of the few persons to whom Lady Olivia Tadcaster bowed submissive, as pre-eminent above her °rani- motive self.

"She had originally made his acquaintance in shooting the falls of the Lahn, on her return from the Taunus mountains, where she had been passing the summer, in order to drink Seltzer water fresh from the rock ; and had since intersected his orbit upon her travels,—once in the cabi- net of the Japanese Palace at Dresden, and once in that of the celebrated restaurateur where the legs of geese are candied in sugar, at Toulouse. He was now recently returned from an Italian tour ; and it was astonish- ing how many dear old friends—Romagnese Princes, Signori Abbati, learned librarians, Arcadian academicians, blue professors, purple emi- nences, ruined temples, ruined roues, captains of banditti, and captains of the papal guard, she found occasion to render the objects of her in- quiries. Like the French marquis, who exclaimed with affectionate re- cognition, in some royal library, 'Ak! moss cher CiCerOn 1—c'est le mime que Marc-Tulle P—her ladyship inquired how the poor dear old Coliseum bad stood the winter, and whether the Palazzo Aldobrandini was likely to get rid of its mar aria 1" The following is the character of a very formidable antique, Lady Derenzy. "Lady Derenzy, the grande dame of her husband's family, who had undertaken the office of ushering its new niece into the great world, was one of those cold, hard, worldly women, who regard the gentle tender- nesses of Nature as the portion of peasants and paupers; yet disdain the influence of fashion as being equally the dowry of parvenus and provin- cial aspirants. Her ladyship's notions had stopped short in their progress with the close of the eighteenth century. She still believed Edwin to be the only comic actor on the stage ;—had not yet done wondering at Del- pines dexterity ;—acknowledged her preference for Rauzzini,—her ad- herence to Arne ;—maintained that no public amusement would ever rival the attractions of Ranelagh, no private one the readings of Texier. She was aware, indeed, that a few trivial changes had been introduced into the march of modern existence,—that such toys as steam-vessels and Congreve rockets had been forced upon public adoption ; but she still cherished a visionary notion that the good old times would one day *return ;—that people would once more sail to Calais, in order to visit Pans, and be powderpuffed by a friseur of the Faubourg St. Germain; and that her grand nephews from White's and the Travellers' would Jive to kneel and crave her blessing in suits of pea-green lustring or rose- coloured plush. "Even as the state policy of the Chinese has rendered contraband all human articles of merchandise, and persists in declining the visits of tour- making dandies and quarto-making literati, with a view to the perpetual retainment of such pleasing delusions as the squareness of the earth, and the unenlightenment of the inhabitants of its surface, saving only those of the canal-besprinkled provinces of the Celestial Empire—Lady Derenzy discriminatingly forbore to admit beneath her roof the paltry innovators of the new century. She was as innocent of the existence of Mechanics'

Institutes, or manufactures of useful knowledge, as the stiffest Tory which ever closed its blinking eyes against the new light, or contemned the rail-road of modern intellectualization ; and having settled herself, during the reign of Strawberry Horace, in a repertorium of old China, enamels; and lap-dogs, at Twickenham, she rarely visited the remote metropolis, excepting, on important public occasions, such as the acces- sion of a new sovereign ; or important private ones, such as the mar- riage or death of one of the direct members of the Derenzy family. She had been highly gratified by the union of her favourite nephew with niece of Lady Olivia Tadcaster,—whom she had regarded for the last forty years as a very estimable young woman ; and whereas she was in the habit of what she was pleased to term paying her duty to their Majes. ties ' every tei or fifteen years—terrifying the modern generation by the apparent resuscitation of a mummy,—she rather courted the task of sponsorship to the new lady of Rawleighford."

The very clever scene which follows occurs at this dame's villa; and gives the authoress occasion to sketch the members of a coterie with great felicity. " The villa inhabited by the widow of Lord Derenzy at Twickenham; was precisely such a cne as might have sheltered the mincing affectation of one of Congreve's heroines, or formed the shrine of a goddess hymned by D'Urfey, or lampooned by Lady Mary Wortley. A blaze of Indian lacker,—a labyrinth of bonzes from the New Exchange, and enamel toys from the counters of Mrs. Chenevis,—specimens of parfilage presented as etrennes to the Lady Sophronia Mandeville, when her right honourable father performed the functions of ambassador at the court of Lewis the Fifteenth, nwrceaux of old Dresden, defying the emulation of Fogg or Baldock,—specimens of turquoise &Wes exceeding the rivalship of Hare- wood House ;—the atmosphere redolent of Marechal,—even the silken lap-dog on its velvet cushion—bespoke the daintiness of the last century I Sachets, pot-pourri, and dragon china were showered in every interstice of the room.

" In this uneasy temple of fragile lux ury,—a temple erected not by the genuine fairies of Titania's court but by the coxcombical elves of Count Hamilton's Tales, or the Cabinet des Fees who are so apt to shower down pralines instead of roses or dimples,—looking out upon a lawn which re- sembled the sunny courtliness of one of Watteau's pictures, sat Lady Derenzy on the evening of the Ash Bank fete ; with Lady Lavinia Lisle, Countess Ronthorst, Miss Harcourt, a superannuated maid of honour, and Mrs. Lucretia Wriothesley, a fragment of the ancient coterie of the Montagus and Vescys.—Each held in her hand a coffee-cup, the size of an acorn and consistency of a canary's eggshell, steaming with a hyacinthine fluid such as might have propitiated the furbelowed ghost of Pope's Be- linda. In the shrill chillness of an early summer evening, they were busy with their coffee and waiting for their cassino and tredrille ;—the vigour of scandal animating their ghastly antiquity into a degree of ora- cular vehemence worthy the weird woman of Endor

"At the head of the conclave was Lady Derenzy herself. But oh I how different the puckered visage beneath her frizzed and powdered toupee, from the graceful dignity of feature embellishing a portrait by Gainsborough suspended at one end of the room, and graced by the in- scription of Sophronia, Baroness Derenzy ;' and still more, from the group in which, with her sisters-in-law Mrs. Martha and the late Lady Rawleigh—at that time blooming hoydens in their teens—she figured in an archery-piece from the animated pencil of Reynolds ; in which the late Lord Derenzy was represented bow in hand and Garter on knee. In the one she appeared a nymph,—in the other a queen; and it would be well for many a nymph and many a queen to be startled by a personal contrast so appalling as that now palpably manifested between the fair and gracious Sophronia, and the stern, and withered, and repellent Lady Derenzy!

"'Shall we have Mr. Broughley this evening ?' simpered Lady Lavinia Lisle to Miss Harcourt,—the only two of the party still able to deal with- out spectacles, and therefore regarded as two playful little creatures whose whisperings might be excused.

" Oh ! no, my dear !—no chance of such a thing. Broughley is quite infatuated by that creature Olivia Tadcaster ; you know he was ever a butterfly ; and it must be owned that with all her flightiness she is very fascinating.'

" Fascinating l' cried Lady Lavinia—' gaudy as a macaw,—and rest. less as a racoon.'

"'You severe thing l' retorted Miss Harcourt, tapping her on the arm,' and looking horrifically arch. You and Olivia were always rivals.' " No !' sighed Lady Lavinia, looking down pathetically on the funera: effigy of departed tenderness glittering on the index of her tragic vo- lume; I thank heaven I have been spared all those rough encounters which betide the hurricane of human passion. Let Lady Olivia possess herself of the heart of Broughley; she will meet with no obstacle from the coquetry of Lavinia Lisle, whose widowed affections are in a better place ;—but our friend has a soul,—dear Miss Harcourt,—our Broughley has a soul ; and I trust I do not offend either the living or the dead, by honouring its high endowments with kindred intercommunion !'

" Vain creature, how ugly she looks !' thought the superannuated maid of honour, gazing on the fashionable wig of her rival - and very cordially would Traveller Broughley, who was at that moment buried with all his spiritual endowments in a chicken-pie at Ash Bank, have echoed the ejaculation. He had no taste for mummies, except at the Royal So- ciety; no predilection for old women, unless in a fresco of the Destinies or the nurse of Ulysses, fresh from the pickaxe at Herculaneum.

" What was that you were saying about Mr. Broughley ?' said Lady Derenzy, whose age and supremacy entitled her to ask impertinent ques- tions. What were those young people saying about our learned friend, my dear Countess ?'

" Lady Lavinia was observing,' said Countess Ronthorst, whose gray eyes had been looking the curiosity she could not gratify,—for she was as deaf as a woodcock,—' that this is the day of the grand gala at Ash Bank ; and that our little coterie will therefore be deprived of the viva- city of Mr. Broughley, the conversibility of Lord George, and General Lorriston—'

" We can spare them,—we can spare any one so little refined in mind and feeling as to prefer a garish crowd to our little intellectual circle,' cried Mrs. Lucretia Wriothesley, propelling her words through a very long nose which acted like a naval speaking-trumpet. " I am very much mistaken if Lorriston ventures his lumbago on any such fool's errand !' exclaimed Lady Derenzy, angrily. I own I am astonished at Lady Olivia l—What would her excellent mother the late Lady Trevelyan have said, to see her giving into the absurdities of these giddy-pated times !—A fete champetre I--well do I recollect the ridicule excited by the introduction of a species of entertainment so ill suited to our pluviose clime !—That wild lad, my friend Burgoyne, wrote his Maid of the Oaks as a satire on the thing. "'But the angelic Farren so stole upon our hearts in Lady Bab Lardoos; that we forgot the moral of the piece !' cried Mrs. Lucretia. " g Ah ! my dear Lady Derenzy !' sighed Miss Harcourt, shall I ever forget a charming day of pastoral happiness I passed with you at Straw- berry Hill in the year seventy-nine ! I was then a giddy creature in a bib ; and well do I recollect—ay ! it must have been in eighty—for well do I recollect that Madame do Deffand's little dog, Tonton, was led for- ward by a pink ribbon as we were taking syllabub on the lawn, and that Horace turned aside as the little innocent creature wagged its tail on approaching us ;—and methought I saw a spot of moisture on his lilac lustring suit. It might have been a tear,—it might have been rain,—it 9» ight have been syllabub.' " Yes I' vociferated Mrs. Lucretia though her nasal tube, convey- ing her snuff-box as she spoke through a labyrinth of quilted petticoats into a bottomless pit of a pocket, "fonton was a prodigious favourite ; and Horace would stand no jesting on the subject of his octogenarian amour. Mrs. Vesey, who could speak plain when she liked, once said to him—bless my soul, I forget what it was she said, but Walpole took out his pencil,—people's pencils were as ready as their wit in those days, and now nobody carries one but an exciseman,—and scratch !—scratch ! —in his little yellow satin souvenir—'

" A stanza !' cried Miss Harcourt.. I was sure of it.'

" He was all sensibility !' said Lady Derenzy, looking as hard as if stuffed with patent iron shavings.

" Mrs. Lucretia, who had been diving intothe same cavernous receptacle which received the tortoiseshell snuff-box, now produced a small morocco note-case, containing sundry bonmots, scraps, sketches, epigrams, and lam- poons—the sybilline leaves of the wizard companions of her youth,—all of which h ave si nee found their way into various arias andperiodicals; although many of the number which had been collected at Paris during her inti- macy with the Geoffrins, and d'Epinays, and d'Houdetots, were marked

with a red cross as being too strong for the English palate. I think I can find it,' said she, affecting to turn over the leaves with an air of uncer- tainty, although they were worn to a diaphanous slightness by incessant reference; and although this little arsenal of squibs and crackers was as familiarly known to its proprietress as a breviary to a priest or a missal to la Reine Claude. Ah ! here it is !—" To Estifania,"—ay ! ay ! the very thing.'

"Lady Lavinia and Miss Harcourt, who affected the vivacity of youth, now hobbled from their seats, and hung over her with breathless atten- tion. Countess Ronthorst put down her coffee-cup, and drew a long breath as if preparatory to the net of attention ; and Lady Derenzy, who loathed that scarlet depository as ardently as ever Mirabeau hated the Livre Rouge, or Cobbett the English pension-list, and who had been com- pelled to listen to this little piece of Marivaud age not less than a thousand times, was obliged to affect an interest in the business. Shchad only one mode of retaliation at her disposal. She was in the confidence of a loose plank in the well-waxed floor, and had a method, when her guests grew tedious, of jogging it with her foot till all the hands and heads of all the mandarins were set in motion ; and every jar, and every beaker, and every ttzza, joined in harmonious dissonance.

" To Estifania!'—chanted Mrs. Lavinia, in defiance.

"'Sweet fair ! whose lips too fiercely deal

The thunder of the skies, Say must our shrinking bosoms feel The lightning of thine eyes ?

(Lavinia, Lucretia, the maid of honour, and the mandarins, wagged their heads in admiring cadence.)

" Ah 1—no, the tender band of love Is gentle as the dove,—

Venus. the child of sovereign Jove May not his rival prove.'

" How sweet ! ' symphonized the quartette. " May I come in ?' said a little plaintive querulous voice at the half. open door; and on universal assent, a little slim spare outline of a man glided towards them on the point of his toes ; a chapeau-bras beneath his arm, with his hair frizzed out a l'oiseau royal. " Ah, General!' cried Miss Harcourt—' I knew you would not desert us.'

" 'Enfin aprh deux fours je te rerois, ilrbate P exclaimed Mrs. Lucretia, with great superfluity of emphasis ; and the general exclamation of de- light and welcome which arose on the entrance of the antiquated Love- lace, deepened into a shrill tumult of rapture, resembling a symphony of triangles, when General Lorriston's nephew, Lord George, the fashion- able lyrist, followed him towards the sofa. With an air resembling the uncouth friskiness of a calf trained into affectation by the labours of a dancing-master, and a cream-coloured face, which in assuming an air of sentiment became irresistibly comic, he glissaded towards them ;—accept- ing a seat between the maid of honour and Lady Margaret with a smile such as would have proved the destruction of the Precieuses Ridicules, while the General devoted his urbanity to the lady of the house.

"'We were apprehensive you had been seduced away to Ash Bank,' sighed Miss Harcourt, deploying her fan and looking the Ranelagh co- quette, while her rival affected an ingenuous and Phyllis-like air. "'To Ath Bank!' lisped Lord George with a start of fastidious horror ; 'am I in the habit of micthing in the indithcwiminate mobth of the fathionable world that you thould taxth me with thuch a pwedilection ?' "I understand,' said Lady Margaret, that Lord Calder, the Duchess of Whitehaven, Lady Osterley, Lady Newby, and all the most exclusive set of London, will be there.'

"'Far be it fwom me to impugn your Ladythip's authowity, or to utter a thyllable in dithpawagement of perthons pothethed of all the pwece- death which wank, opulenth, and fathion can bethtow ; but pardon me, Lady Magawet, pardon me, Mith_Harcowt,—if without pwethuming on my own—,

"'George!' exclaimed the General, instigated by an unusual flutter of spirit, which rendered him for the first time in his life so disregardful of etiquette as to interrupt a speaker having the ear of the house,—' what was the name of that very „gentlemanly man who sat opposite me at dinner to-day, and whom Lady Wroxworth talked of brill...mg here this evening ? Surely I am not mistaken in stating it to be Vaddlestone! " Impossible!' shrieked every female present ; Lady Wroxworth has too much sense l' cried Lady Lavinia. " ' Lady Wroxworth has too much feeling !' said Countess Ron- thorst.

"'Lady Wroxworth has too much principle!' ejaculated the maid of honour.

"'Lady Wroxworth knows too well what is due to herself 1' mouthed Mrs. Lucretia.

" Lady Wroxworth knows too well what is due to me ! ' said Lady De- renzy with majestic dignity ; and rising from her seat, like Semiramis from her throne, she rang the bell, and addressed herself most imperially to the astonished butler. ' Wathen 1 if Lady Wroxworth presents herself here to-night, you will have the kindness to express to her ladyship, with the respectful deference due to all my accustomed guests, that this

evening my circle is limited to my own privileged and familiar friends. You understand me !—tea and the card-tables !

" You understand me, tea and the card-tables !' ejaculated the as- tonished domestic as he traversed the vestibule. The housekeeper may, perhaps, understand setting out tea, and John or Thomas the quadrille table ;—but if any born mortal can understand my lady when she gets into her tantrums, he never stood in Jeremiah Wathen's shoes.'"

On the whole, tired as we are of the fashionable novel, we must admit that this is a very amusing book, by a very clever writer. She has all the talent for observation which marks the most intelligent of her sex, with more patient reflection, and a greater aptitude for connecting traits and developing motives, than. usually falls to the lot of either male or female observers.