it was not too absurd in
the Duke to interfere with the Duchess's arrangements.

Lord Lindore was a frequent visitor at Altamont House; for the Duke,
satisfied with his having been once refused, was no wise jealous of him;
and Lord Lindore was too quiet and refined in his attentions to excite
the attention of anyone so stupid and obtuse. It was not the least of
the Duchess's mortifications to be constantly contrasting her former
lover--elegant, captivating, and _spirituel--_with her husband, awkward,
insipid, and dull, as the fat weed that rots on Lethe's shore. Lord
Lindore was indeed the most admired man in London, celebrated for his
conquests, his horses, his elegance, manner, dress; in short, in
everything he gave the tone. But he had too much taste to carry anything
to extreme; and in the midst of incense, and adulation, and imitation,
he still retained that simple unostentatious elegance that marks the man
of real fashion--the man who feels his own consequence, independent of
all extraneous modes or fleeting fashions.

There is, perhaps, nothing so imposing, nothing that carries a greater
sway over a mind of any refinement, than simplicity, when we feel
assured that it springs from a genuine contempt of show and ostentation.
Lord Lindore was aware of this, and he did not attempt to vie with the
Duke of Altamont in the splendour of his equipage, the richness of his
liveries, the number of his attendants, or any of those previous
attractions attractions; on the contrary, everything belonging to him
was of the plainest description; and, except in the beauty of his
horses, he seemed to scorn every species of extravagance; but then he
rode with so much elegance, he drove his curricle with such graceful
ease, as formed a striking contrast to the formal Duke, sitting
bolt-upright in his state chariot, _chapeau bras,_ and star; and the
Duchess often quitted the Park, where Lord Lindore was the admired of
all admirers, mortified and ashamed at being seen in the same carriage
with the man she had chosen for her husband. Ambition had led her to
marry the Duke, and that same passion now heightened her attachment for
Lord Lindore; for, as some one has remarked, ambition is not always the
desire for that which is in itself excellent, but for that which is most
prized by others; and the handsome Lord Lindore was courted and caressed
in circles where the dull, precise Duke of Altamont was wholly
overlooked. Months passed in thi