t of giving her, had her happiness been his only object.
And he did not think of so bestowing her now. He became uneasy
when he remembered the danger. He was unhappy as he remembered
how amusing, how handsome, how attractive was Cousin George. He
feared that Emily might like him!--by no means hoped it. And yet he
vacillated, and allowed Cousin George to come to the house, only
because Cousin George must become, on his death, the head of the
Hotspurs.

Cousin George came on one Sunday, came on another Sunday, dined at
the house, and was of course asked to the ball. But Lady Elizabeth
had so arranged her little affairs that when Cousin George left
Bruton Street on the evening of the dinner party he and Emily had
never been for two minutes alone together since the family had come
up to London. Lady Elizabeth herself liked Cousin George, and, had an
edict to that effect been pronounced by her husband, would have left
them alone together with great maternal satisfaction. But she had
been told that it was not to be so, and therefore the young people
had never been allowed to have opportunities. Lady Elizabeth in her
very quiet way knew how to do the work of the world that was allotted
to her. There had been other balls, and there had been ridings in
the Park, and all the chances of life which young men, and sometimes
young women also, know so well how to use; but hitherto Cousin George
had kept, or had been constrained to keep, his distance.

"I want to know, Mamma," said Emily Hotspur, the day before the ball,
"whether Cousin George is a black sheep or a white sheep?"

"What do you mean, my dear, by asking such a question as that?"

"I don't like black sheep. I don't see why young men are to be
allowed to be black sheep; but yet you know they are."

"How can it be helped?"

"People should not notice them, Mamma."

"My dear, it is a most difficult question,--quite beyond me, and I am
sure beyond you. A sheep needn't be black always because he has not
always been quite white; and then you know the black lambs are just
as dear to their mother as the white."

"Dearer, I think."

"I quite agree with you, Emily, that in general society black sheep
should be avoided."

"Then they shouldn't be allowed to come in," said Emily. Lady
Elizabeth knew from this that there was danger, but the danger was
not of a kind which enabled her specially to consult Sir Harry.

CHAPTER V.

GEORGE HOTSPUR.

A little must now