orced to relinquish it. My unsuccessful opponent, Mr. Lufton, preferred
a petition against me, for what he called undue means. God knows what he
meant; I am sure the House did not, for they turned me out, and declared
Mr. Lufton duly elected.

Never was there such a commotion in the Glenmorris family before.
My uncle was seized with the gout in his stomach, and my mother shut
herself up with Tremaine, and one China monster, for a whole week. As
for me, though I writhed at heart, I bore the calamity philosophically
enough in external appearance, nor did I the less busy myself in
political matters: with what address and success, good or bad, I
endeavoured to supply the loss of my parliamentary influence, the reader
will see, when it suits the plot of this history to touch upon such
topics.

Glanville I saw continually. When in tolerable spirits, he was an
entertaining, though never a frank nor a communicative companion. His
conversation then was lively, yet without wit, and sarcastic, though
without bitterness. It abounded also in philosophical reflections
and terse maxims, which always brought improvement, or, at the
worst, allowed discussion. He was a man of even vast powers--of
deep thought--of luxuriant, though dark imagination, and of great
miscellaneous, though, perhaps, ill arranged erudition. He was fond of
paradoxes in reasoning, and supported them with a subtlety and strength
of mind, which Vincent, who admired him greatly, told me he had never
seen surpassed. He was subject, at times, to a gloom and despondency,
which seemed almost like aberration of intellect. At those hours he
would remain perfectly silent, and apparently forgetful of my presence,
and of every object around him.

It was only then, when the play of his countenance was vanished, and his
features were still and set, that you saw in their full extent, the dark
and deep traces of premature decay. His cheek was hollow and hueless;
his eye dim, and of that visionary and glassy aspect, which is never
seen but in great mental or bodily disease, and which, according to
the superstitions of some nations, implies a mysterious and unearthly
communion of the soul with the beings of another world. From these
trances he would sometimes start abruptly, and renew any conversation
broken off before, as if wholly unconscious of the length of his
reverie. At others, he would rise slowly from his seat, and retire into
his own apartment, from which he never emer