which none of the O’Reilly’s ever obtained; and they are afraid that you are come here to take the eldest brother’s post from him, and that you are to command the troops upon the second expedition to Algiers; for every body is much dissatisfied with his conduct on the first; adding, that the Spaniards do not love him.—­I told him, that might arise from his being a stranger; but I had been well assured, and I firmly believed it, that he is a gallant, an able, and a good officer; but, said I, that cannot be the reason of so much shyness in the Intendant, even if it does raise any uneasiness in the O’Reilly’s family:—­Yes, said he, it does; for the Captain-General O’Reilly is married lately to one of the Intendant’s daughters.  So you see here was another mine sprung under me; and I determined to set out in a day or two for Montserrat.  I had but one card more to play, and that was to carry the open letter I had to the French Consul, and which, I forgot to tell you, I had shewn to the acute, discerning, and sagacious merchant Wombwell.  It was written by Madame de Maigny, the Lady of the Chevalier de Maigny, of the regiment d’Artois, one of the Gentlemen with whom I had eat that voluptuous supper in company at Pont St. Esprit; but, as Mr. Wombwell shrewdly observed, my name was not even mentioned in that letter, it was the bearer only who was recommended; and how could that Lady, any more than Mr. Wombwell, tell, but that I had murdered the first bearer, and robbed him of his recommendatory letter, and dressed myself in his scarlet and gold-laced coat, to practise the same wicked arts upon their lives and fortunes?

Now, you will naturally wish to know how Sir Thomas Gascoyne, my vis-a-vis neighbour in the same Hotel, conducted himself.  I had, before all this fuss, eat, drank, and conversed with him:  he is a sensible, genteel, well-bred man; and there was with him Mr. Swinburne, who was equally agreeable:  no wonder, therefore, if I endeavoured to cultivate an acquaintance with two such men, so much superior, in all respects, to what the town afforded.  Sir Thomas, however, became rather reserved; perhaps not more so than good policy made necessary for a man who was only just entering upon a grand tour through the whole kingdom, from Barcelona to Cadiz, Madrid, &c. &c.  I perceived this shyness, but did not resent it, because I could not censure it.  He had no suspicion of me at first; and if he had afterwards, I could not tell what circumstances might have been urged against me; and I considered, that if a man of his fortune and figure could have been suspected, there was much reason for him to join with others in suspecting me.