old philanthropist used to make her equal run of her errands, execute
her millinery, and read her to sleep with French novels, every night.

At this time, as some old readers may recollect, the genteel world had
been thrown into a considerable state of excitement by two events,
which, as the papers say, might give employment to the gentlemen of the
long robe. Ensign Shafton had run away with Lady Barbara Fitzurse, the
Earl of Bruin's daughter and heiress; and poor Vere Vane, a gentleman
who, up to forty, had maintained a most respectable character and
reared a numerous family, suddenly and outrageously left his home, for
the sake of Mrs. Rougemont, the actress, who was sixty-five years of
age.

"That was the most beautiful part of dear Lord Nelson's character,"
Miss Crawley said. "He went to the deuce for a woman. There must be
good in a man who will do that. I adore all impudent matches.-- What
I like best, is for a nobleman to marry a miller's daughter, as Lord
Flowerdale did--it makes all the women so angry--I wish some great man
would run away with you, my dear; I'm sure you're pretty enough."

"Two post-boys!--Oh, it would be delightful!" Rebecca owned.

"And what I like next best, is for a poor fellow to run away with a
rich girl. I have set my heart on Rawdon running away with some one."

"A rich some one, or a poor some one?"

"Why, you goose! Rawdon has not a shilling but what I give him. He is
crible de dettes--he must repair his fortunes, and succeed in the
world."

"Is he very clever?" Rebecca asked.

"Clever, my love?--not an idea in the world beyond his horses, and his
regiment, and his hunting, and his play; but he must succeed--he's so
delightfully wicked. Don't you know he has hit a man, and shot an
injured father through the hat only? He's adored in his regiment; and
all the young men at Wattier's and the Cocoa-Tree swear by him."

When Miss Rebecca Sharp wrote to her beloved friend the account of the
little ball at Queen's Crawley, and the manner in which, for the first
time, Captain Crawley had distinguished her, she did not, strange to
relate, give an altogether accurate account of the transaction. The
Captain had distinguished her a great number of times before. The
Captain had met her in a half-score of walks. The Captain had lighted
upon her in a half-hundred of corridors and passages. The Captain had
hung over her piano twenty times of an evening (my Lady was now
upstairs,