ou have reason,' replied his sister; 'but I got so terrible a specimen
of my uncle's determination of character, before I had been acquainted
with him for much more than a week, that it taught me at what risk I
should contradict his humour. I will tell you the circumstances; for it
will better teach you to appreciate the romantic and resolved nature
of his character, than anything which I could state of his rashness and
enthusiasm.

'After I had been many a long year at the convent, I was removed from
thence, and placed with a meagre old Scottish lady of high rank, the
daughter of an unfortunate person whose head had in the year 1715 been
placed on Temple Bar. She subsisted on a small pension from the French
Court, aided by an occasional gratuity from the Stuarts; to which the
annuity paid for my board formed a desirable addition. She was not
ill-tempered, nor very covetous--neither beat me nor starved me--but she
was so completely trammelled by rank and prejudices, so awfully profound
in genealogy, and so bitterly keen, poor lady, in British, politics,
that I sometimes thought it pity that the Hanoverians, who murdered, as
she used to tell me, her poor dear father, had left his dear daughter in
the land of the living. Delighted, therefore, was I, when my uncle made
his appearance, and abruptly announced his purpose of conveying me
to England. My extravagant joy at the idea of leaving Lady Rachel
Rougedragon was somewhat qualified by observing the melancholy look,
lofty demeanour, and commanding tone of my near relative. He held more
communication with me on the journey, however, than consisted with his
taciturn demeanour in general, and seemed anxious to ascertain my tone
of character, and particularly in point of courage. Now, though I am
a tamed Redgauntlet, yet I have still so much of our family spirit as
enables me to be as composed in danger as most of my sex; and upon two
occasions in the course of our journey--a threatened attack by banditti,
and the overturn of our carriage--I had the fortune so to conduct
myself, as to convey to my uncle a very favourable idea of my
intrepidity. Probably this encouraged him to put in execution the
singular scheme which he had in agitation.

'Ere we reached London we changed our means of conveyance, and altered
the route by which we approached the city, more than once; then, like a
hare which doubles repeatedly at some distance from the seat she means
to occupy, and at last le