Frank's mind a striking resemblance to the cabriolet driver, whom he had before identified with the Viscount.

There was one part of this discovery satisfactory to Welsted; it was clear that the invitation did not proceed from mistake, and he felt pleased and gratified that one of his earliest pupils should thus kindly remember him, and that the Earl (recently ennobled by the death of his brother) should unite with his son, in bestowing upon him so singular a mark of personal approbation.

Scarcely had Frank ascertained the fact that he was really known and really invited by the noblemen, before the waiter, marching pompously up the centre of the coffee-room, delivered him a small triangular note, saying in an audible voice, "His Lordship's servant is waiting for an answer, Sir:"-the eyes and ears of the hay-salesmen and pettifoggers, were forthwith turned on Welsted. The note was from Lord Feversham, stating, that they were anxious to know if he could dine with the Earl. Welsted forthwith wrote his reply, accepting the invitation, and having dispatched the note,

proceeded to breakfast with what appetite he might.

His first business for the morning, as he had previously arranged it, was writing a letter to Rodney, but there appeared something so singular in the event which had just occurred -something like a probability that his talents might be required in some other sphere-that he resolved to defer his letter to his old master till the following day, since the delay of one post could do no mischief, and might possibly produce some new adventure.

The morning passed feverishly with Frank, for he was unused to society, and had moreover, since truth must be told, a kind of contempt for nobility. Whence this feeling originated I know not, unless in the perusal of works and public papers, whose writers have the worst of objects in endeavouring to ridicule and vilify the best of people, and who, without ever having had an opportunity of judging personally of good society, consider it part of their daily duty, as tending to the great end they have in view, to make it appear that every individual superior to themselves, is either a fool or a knave; that it is only necessary to place a coro

net on a man's head to weaken his intellects; and that vice and dissipation (which in truth flourish more in the middling and lower classes, than any where else,) are the exclusive characteristics of the best-born and best-bred part of the British population.

To analyse a feeling so absurd, and so unworthy of a man possessing even an average share of common sense, can never be worth while. It is sufficient to state the fact, that under the misleading influence of the underlings of literature, poor Frank had established in his mind as fact, that all lords lolled and lounged about, and pried through "quizzing glasses," and said, "'pon my honour," and "gad, how charming," and had no feelings, and were proud, and senseless, and rude to their inferiors; and that ladies of family invariably lisped out nothingnesses, and talked the same silly sort of stuff as their fathers and brothers, and husbands in short, he knew no more of such people, than he had learned from those who knew as little as himself, and fretted himself into half a fever with considering how this was to be done, and how that was to be managed in his visit to the Earl, doubting even until the

tavern clock had stricken seven, whether he should not send an apology, and eat his mutton chop in the coffee-room as heretofore.

Rallying however all his energies, he resolved, full of disagreeable anticipations, to undertake the expedition; and as the clock of Saint Andrew's proclaimed the first quarter after the seventh hour, Frank Welsted mounted the iron ladder of a hackney coach, and depositing his legs amongst the dirty straw beneath, directed the driver to Lord Farnbo- . rough's house, in Grosvenor-Square.

CHAPTER VII.

"O call not to my mind what you have done; It sets a debt of that account before me, Which shews me poor and bankrupt."

CONGREVE.

THE pre-disposition against nobility with which, as I have just observed, Welsted was so unaccountably gifted, preyed upon his mind during his rattling drive towards Grosvenor Square, and as the coach turned into that splendid street, which, while it does honour to the monarch under whose auspices it was designed, will confer immortal fame upon the highly-gifted architect by whose taste and industry it has been so splendidly and rapidly executed, the heart of our hero sank within him; and even thus far advanced in his progress, he was half determined to abandon the enterprise as it happened, however, the coachman, having nothing to think of but getting to