“With such a recommendation, Lord Aspeden,”
said the minister, with a bow, “the state would
be a great loser did it not elect your attache, who
plays so admirably on the flute, to the office of your
secretary. Let us join the dancers.”
“I shall go and talk with Count B——,”
quoth Mr. St. George.
“And I shall make my court to his beautiful
wife,” said the minister, sauntering into the
ballroom, to which his fine person and graceful manners
were much better adapted than was his genius to the
cabinet or his eloquence to the senate.
The morning had long dawned, and Clarence, for whose
mind pleasure was more fatiguing than business, lingered
near the door, to catch one last look of Lady Flora
before he retired. He saw her leaning on the
arm of Lord Borodaile, and hastening to join the dancers
with her usual light step and laughing air; for Clarence’s
short conference with her had, in spite of his subsequent
flirtations, rendered her happier than she had ever
felt before. Again a change passed over Clarence’s
countenance,—a change which I find it difficult
to express without borrowing from those celebrated
German dramatists who could portray in such exact
colours “a look of mingled joy, sorrow, hope,
passion, rapture, and despair;” for the look
was not that of jealousy alone, although it certainly
partook of its nature, but a little also of interest,
and a little of sorrow; and when he turned away, and
slowly descended the stairs, his eyes were full of
tears, and his thoughts far—far away;—whither?
Quae fert adolescentia
Ea ne me celet consuefeci
filium.—Terence.
["The things which youth proposes
I accustomed
my son that he should never
conceal from me.”]
The next morning Clarence was lounging over his breakfast,
and glancing listlessly now at the pages of the newspapers,
now at the various engagements for the week, which
lay confusedly upon his table, when he received a
note from Talbot, requesting to see him as soon as
possible.
“Had it not been for that man,” said Clarence
to himself, “what should I have been now?
But, at least, I have not disgraced his friendship.
I have already ascended the roughest because the lowest
steps on the hill where Fortune builds her temple.
I have already won for the name I have chosen some
‘golden opinions’ to gild its obscurity.
One year more may confirm my destiny and ripen hope
into success: then—then, I may perhaps
throw off a disguise that, while it befriended, has
not degraded me, and avow myself to her! Yet
how much better to dignify the name I have assumed
than to owe respect only to that which I have not
been deemed worthy to inherit! Well, well, these
are bitter thoughts; let me turn to others.
How beautiful Flora looked last night! and, he—he—but
enough of this: I must dress, and then to Talbot.”
