re myself of
my own errors, I hate them too much to wish any one to imitate them.
When you have done reading," he added, "come and join me at Monsieur
Faubert's Riding School, in the lane going up to the Oxford Road: I see
your horse at the door--I will get one there, and we will have a ride
in the country. By heavens, what a beautiful picture! It is quite a
little gem. That child's head must be a Correggio."
"I believe it is," replied Wilton: "I saw it accidentally at an auction,
and bought it for a mere trifle."
"You have the eye of a judge," replied his companion.
"Do not be long ere you join me;" and looking at every little object of
ornament or luxury that the room contained, standing a minute or two
before another picture, taking up, and examining all over, a small
bronze urn, that stood on one of the tables, and criticising the hilts
of two or three of Wilton's swords, that stood in the corner of the
room, he made his way out, like Hamlet, "without his eyes," and left his
new acquaintance to read his letter in peace.
In that letter, which was in every respect most kind, Wilton found that
the Earl gave a detailed account of the character of the young nobleman
who had just left him. He represented him, very much as he had
represented himself, full of follies, and, unfortunately, but too much
addicted to let those follies run into vices. "Though he neither gambled
nor drank for pleasure," the Earl said, "yet, as if for variety, he
would sometimes do both to excess. In other respects, he had lived a
life of great profligacy, seeming utterly careless of the reproaches of
any one, and rather taking means to make any fresh act of licence
generally known, than to conceal it. Nor is this," continued the Earl,
"from that worst of all vanities, which attaches fame to what is
infamous, and confounds notoriety with renown, but rather from a sort of
daringness of disposition, which prompts him to avow openly any act to
which there may be risk attached. With all these bad qualities," the
Earl proceeded, "there are many good ones. To be bold as a lion is but a
corporeal endowment, but he adds to that the most perfect sincerity and
frankness.
"He would neither falsify his word nor deny an act that he has committed
for the world. His mind is sufficiently acute, and his heart
sufficiently good, to see distinctly the evils of unbridled licence, and
to condemn it in his own case; and he is the last man in the world who
would lead or encourage any one in that course