ters, or give balls and dinners, or can put him into fashion, if not in it already. But this cannot be where there is celibacy; and even when married, merit and female worth alone will make a man look twice at her, on her own account."

I felt all the force of this truth, and only wondered where Oldacre got it.

I have, however, been occupied with a lesson of a higher nature than that given by the little vanities of the sex; for Oldacre's male friends (particularly one of them) have also furnished me with much food for observation.

But this must be the subject of another letter.

So farewell.

W. F.

LETTER VI.

Fitzwalter in continuation.

A PORTRAIT.

OLDACRE has a neighbour who, though similar in principles, is very different from him in the light and shade of character;-less outwardly angry, but more deeply and lastingly moved; of very high mind and keen sensibility, particularly in all affairs of the heart. In politics he is not a greater aristocrat than Oldacre, but the feeling is more sunk in his mind, and even as it were in his nature. Of a very ancient and most loyal family, many of whom bled for Charles in the field, and one on the scaffold, all semblance of republicanism gives him a horror-not so much as regards political character in the abstract (for he holds as keenly as any republican, that every man has a right to his opinion), but because, in this country, he thinks no man can be a republican without being a rebel; and a rebel where there is no oppression, and where all are, or may be, happy, is in his mind

no better than an assassin. This, he says, applies to the most sincere and conscientious in their creed ; but these are few; while most republicans, at least in this country, he thinks are a compound of vanity, envy, and love of pillage; and their being forced to act under the mask of patriotism, adds the crowning vice of hypocrisy to their other crimes.

Such are the deep-seated opinions of Sir Robert Penruddock; and it must be owned, when Oldacre introduced me to him, his appearance, manner, voice, and language, corresponded most exactly with the picture which he had drawn of him. By the way, our said friend Oldacre, as you may have seen, draws pictures admirably well; nor must you suppose him a mere Yorkshire Tike, because having lived at home these last thirty years, he is somewhat of a humorist. Eton, Christchurch, and Boodle's did much for him in earlier life, which he has by no means forgotten; and reading has quite as much engaged him as fox-hunting, fishing, or farming. He is therefore formed to admire Penruddock, whom I must now introduce to you.

I met him first at a dinner given by Oldacre to several of his neighbours, of different creeds; for mine host is of too jolly a character to sacrifice good fellowship, as he calls it, to politics :-very different in this, from his friend.

Sir Robert, however, had a melancholy and thoughtful look, and a determination on his brow, which I thought party or political feeling alone could not have created; it seemed so interwoven in his whole manner, that it must be constitutional. He appeared as if whatever touched his feelings, absorbed them, and he gave me the idea of a man devoured by a morbid sensibility; certainly not easy to be turned from any feeling, or even any notion, that thoroughly possessed him.

Though under forty, an already furrowed cheek and sunken eye (the evident effects of habitual pondering upon some all-engrossing subject) had brought him almost to a level with Oldacre in appearance. His eye indeed shewed that it could be one of fire; but, except when occasion made it sparkle, its lustre was much weakened.

I was the more surprised at this, because I learned from Oldacre that in earlier life he had lived much in the world-had served-had been in Parliament -had travelled, and met with adventures bordering on romance; and yet for the last dozen years he had shut himself up in his hall in the West Riding, whence he emerges only twice a year in his coach and four (his father and grandfather drove six) to the assizes, where he is often foreman of the grand jury.

From all these circumstances he had retained,

still more than his friend, that originality of character, which for the most part yields to the perpetual interchange of conventional forms, and is generally at last smoothed down to a level with the rest of the world. Hence you could not help distinguishing him at a glance, from whatever company he was in, for a sort of pensive dignity, which commands both your interest and your esteem. Moreover he has not wasted himself in retirement, but is cultivated, particularly in English history and belles-lettres; so that his conversation is never trifling. He is, however, too naturally well-bred to obtrude it upon any one, and whenever he spoke at our dinner, he always seemed to follow, not to lead the conversation. When introduced to him as Mr. Fitzwalter, he said it was an excellent name, and he believed our ancestors had been acquainted. He had favourite topics and authors. Among them, from many family incidents, the chief were the Great Rebellion, and Clarendon; and they were not a little brought forth, in a conversation started by a flippant young banker and reformer of the West Riding, who, looking pertly at Sir Robert, begged to give him a toast-" Success to Reform."

As nothing called for this, and Sir Robert had reasons for rueing it, known to the company though not to me, I observed it was considered as bad taste in the Reformer, whose name was Wingate. He