s and confronting lions, the
young man as yet went through the world harmless; no giant waylaid him
as yet; no robbing ogre fed on him: and (greatest danger of all for one
of his ardent nature) no winning enchantress or artful siren coaxed him
to her cave, or lured him into her waters--haunts into which we know so
many young simpletons are drawn, where their silly bones are picked and
their tender flesh devoured.

The time was short which Clive spent at Baden, for it has been said the
winter was approaching, and the destination of our young artists was
Rome; but he may have passed some score of days here, to which he
and another person in that pretty watering-place possibly looked back
afterwards, as not the unhappiest period of their lives. Among Colonel
Newcome's papers to which the family biographer has had subsequent
access, there are a couple of letters from Clive, dated Baden, at this
time, and full of happiness, gaiety, and affection. Letter No. 1 says,
"Ethel is the prettiest girl here. At the assemblies all the princes,
counts, dukes, Parthians, Medes, and Elamites, are dying to dance with
her. She sends her dearest love to her uncle." By the side of the words
"prettiest girl," was written in a frank female hand the monosyllable
"Stuff;" and as a note to the expression "dearest love," with a star
to mark the text and the note, are squeezed, in the same feminine
characters, at the bottom of Clive's page, the words, "That I do. E. N."

In letter No. 2, the first two pages are closely written in Clive's
handwriting, describing his pursuits and studies, and giving
amusing details of the life at Baden, and the company whom he met
there--narrating his rencontre with their Paris friend, M. de Florac,
and the arrival of the Duchesse d'Ivry, Florac's cousin, whose titles
the Vicomte will probably inherit. Not a word about Florac's gambling
propensities are mentioned in the letter; but Clive honestly confesses
that he has staked five Napoleons, doubled them, quadrupled them, won
ever so much, lost it all back again, and come away from the table with
his original five pounds in his pocket--proposing never to play any
more. "Ethel," he concluded, "is looking over my shoulder. She thinks me
such a delightful creature that she is never easy without me. She bids
me to say that I am the best of sons and cousins, and am, in a word, a
darling du--" The rest of this important word is not given, but goose is
added in the female h