y! And now for the reality,--the
very prettiest girl I ever saw, since I left off seeing
pretty people, when I was young and had pretensions myself:
even then I do not remember any one handsomer, and with a
winning grace of manner equal, if not superior, to her
beauty. You know me as a very difficult critic on the
subject of breeding and _maintien_. I feel that I am so,
even to injustice, because I look for the reserved courtesy
of one era as well as the easy frankness of another. _She_
has both; and she is a court lady who could adorn a
cottage. Of my own atrocious sketch there was nothing about
her. Stay, there was. She had the Irish accent, but by
some witchery of her own I got to like it,--fancied it was
musical and breathed of the sweet south; but if I go on
with her perfections, I shall never come to the important
question, for which you care more to hear besides, as to how
I know all these things. And now, to my horror, I find how
little space is left me to tell you. Well, in three words
you shall have it. She has been here to see me on her way
somewhere, her visit being prompted by the wish to place in
my hands some very curious and very old family records,
found by a singular accident in an Irish country-house. They
relate to the claim of some ancestor of yours to certain
lands in Ireland, and the right is asserted in the name of
Baron Conway, and afterwards the Lord Viscount Lackington. I
saw no further; indeed, except that they all relate to our
dear peerage, they seem to possess no very peculiar
interest. If it were not that she would introduce your name,
push me with interminable questions as to what it was you
had really done, what rewards you had or were about to reap,
where you were, and, above all, how, I should have called
her visit the most disinterested piece of kindness I ever
heard of. Still she showed a sincere and ardent desire to
serve us, and said that she would be ready to make any delay
in London to communicate with our lawyer, and acquaint him
fully with the circumstances of this discovery.

"I unceasingly entreated her to be my guest, were it only
for a few days. I even affected to believe that I would send
for our lawyer to come down and learn the curious details of
the finding of the pape