me you may like to draw.”  “My dear sir,” I replied, “you are most considerate, and all I can say is, if I have the misfortune to lose this packet (it was a roll of Herries’s circular notes) I shall gladly accept your offer; but just now I have more than I want—­L300.”  “Well then, sir, come and stay at my house, Fifth Avenue.”  “This is very kind, but several friends here have specially invited me, so I am compelled to decline.”  “Then, sir, my yacht in the harbour is at your service.”  “Pardon me, but I would rather forget all memories of the sea at present,—­with due thanks.”  “Then, sir, my carriage has been waiting at the hotel all this time, let me have the honour of taking you to see Mrs. So-and-so, who is anxious to meet you.”  Of course I could not refuse this, nor the occasional loan of his handsome turn-out whenever other friends let me go.  Who knows how nearly I then missed smiles from the blind goddess, by my sturdy refusal of her favours, for I heard afterwards that the wealthy Mr.——­ was childless!  Again, at Baltimore, after my Historical dinner (see a former page), comes up to me a very shabby-looking man, as I thought to beg.  He sidled up and whispered that he wanted me to go home with him.  I’m afraid I rather snubbed him; but was sorry for it afterwards, when told that he was the rich old miser So-and-so, who had never taken a fancy to any one before.  What a dolt I must have been to snub away the possible codicil of a millionaire!

* * * * *

On page 3 of this book I proposed no mention of private domesticities or of personal religious experiences—­the one being of interest merely to my family, the other a matter between God and the soul.  However, the recent sudden death of one for fifty years my faithful friend and companion in marriage, urges me to record here simply her many excellent qualities, which must not be passed by without a regretful word as if I were a Stoic, or as if my dear good wife of half a century could be silently forgotten by her bereaved husband and children.  I began this biography when she was in her usual health and spirits, but soon after its commencement a fit of apoplexy took her unconsciously from our happy circle,—­and we are made to feel by this affliction, as also by another over leaf, how truly “in the midst of life we are in death.”  Her body awaits the Resurrection in Albury Churchyard, and her spirit lives with us in affectionate remembrance.

CHAPTER XLVI.

DE BEAUVOIR CHANCERY SUIT:  AND BELGRAVIA.

My lamented son, Henry de Beauvoir, active and athletic, was killed in South Africa by the most unlikely accident of being jolted off the front seat in a rutty road and crushed to death under the wheel of an ox-waggon creeping at two miles an hour!  This sad event occurred on May 31, 1871:  and the newspapers at the time, both British and South African, fully recorded not only the accident but the heroism of the