do. _Apropos_ of
commissions. I had nearly omitted, in my own family anxieties, to
mention the object for which I began my letter. I have _failed_ in
arranging the affair of your commission! This was not for want of
zeal. But the prospect of a war has deranged and inflamed every
thing. The young nobility have actually besieged the Horse-guards.
All the weight of the aristocracy has pressed upon the minister, and
minor influence has been driven from the field. The spirit is too
gallant a one to be blamed;--and yet--are there not a hundred other
pursuits, in which an intelligent and active mind, like your own,
might follow on the way to fortune? You have seen enough of
campaigning to know, that it is not all a flourish of trumpets. Has
the world but one gate, and that the Horse-guards? If my personal
judgment were to be asked, I should feel no regret for a
disappointment which may have come only to turn your knowledge and
ability to purposes not less suitable to an ambitious spirit, nor
less likely to produce a powerful impression on the world--the only
thing, after all, worth living for! You may laugh at this language
from a man of my country and my trade. But even _I_ have my ambition;
and you may yet discover it to be not less bold than if I carried the
lamp of Gideon, or wielded the sword of the Maccabee.--I must stop
again; my poor restless child is coming into the room at this moment,
complaining of the chill, in one of the finest days of summer. She
says that this villa has grown sunless, airless, and comfortless.
Finding that I am writing to you, she sends her best wishes; and bids
me ask, what is the fashionable colour for mantles in Paris, and also
what is become of that 'wandering creature,' Lafontaine, if you
should happen to recollect such a personage."

"P.S.--My daughter insists on our setting out from Brighton
to-morrow, and crossing the Channel the day after. She has a whim for
revisiting Switzerland; and in the mean time begs that if, during our
absence, _you_ should have a whim for sea air and solitude, you may
make of the villa any use you please.--Yours sincerely,

"J.V. MORDECAI."

After reading this strange and broken letter, I was almost glad that
I had not seen Mariamne. Lafontaine was in her heart still, in spite
of absence. At this I did not wonder, for the heart of woman, when
once struck, is almost incapable of change: but the suspense was
killing her; and I had no doubt that her loss w