178 THE FANCY BALL. 



his " Young May Moon ' absolutely obscured ; but then it 

 had always been his care to chase away from it every passing, 

 or even approaching, cloud ; and he would certainly have liked, 

 in return, that its very brightest rays should have shone on 

 him direct, instead of reaching him only, as it were, reflected 

 from what in his eyes, certainly, were very inferior objects. 



\\ < had passed some weeks at our entertainer's cottage, when 

 rumours got afloat, such as had not disturbed, for many a year, 

 the standing, and sometimes stagnant, pool of Goslingtou 

 society. The son of Lord AY was about to come of age, 

 and the event was to be celebrated by grand doings : a varied 



i/O D ' 



string of entertainments, to be woundup, so it was whispered, 

 by a great parti-coloured or fancy ball. Rumours were soon 

 silenced by certainty, and our friends were amongst those who 

 received an invitation to meet all the world of Goslington and 

 a fragment of the world of London, about to be brought into 

 strange conjunction at AY- - castle. AYhat shapes! grotesque, 

 and gay, and gorgeous ghosts of things departed started up 

 before the sparkling eyes of Emily, as she put the reviving 

 talisman into I 1 - -s hand. Xo wonder that her charmed sight 

 failed to discover what was, however, sufficiently apparent, that 

 her husband's delight at the honour done them by no means 

 equalled her's. Indeed w r e were pretty certain that not merely 

 dissatisfaction, but even dissent, was to be read in his com- 

 pressed lip, and, for once, forbidding eye. 



Nothing was said then upon the subject ; but we saw the 



