MATING A LADY TO A GEOOM 47 



Let me give a curious illustration: I 

 once knew intimately a great, grand, proud 

 old family, whose name is now absolutely 

 extinct, sprung from one illustrious ances- 

 tor. They had a daughter who, at the age 

 of 35 or 40, ran away with a young, unedu- 

 cated, but bright Irish groom, whose an- 

 cestral breeding was lost, and who died 

 about the time of the birth of her second 

 son. She was forgotten by her family and 

 forgotten by the world. Of her two sons, 

 one was no account, the other exceptionally 

 bright ; at one moment he showed his high 

 breeding and, at the next, all the charac- 

 teristics of a tricky, suspicious fellow. 

 How I have enjoyed watching him. Now 

 the peacock! Now the duck! Then to 

 watch the countenances of high-bred people 

 in their intercourse with him, for he is 

 exceedingly clever ; now they lean forward 

 to oatch his witty, choicely put together 

 sentences; suddenly, they draw back, they 

 have caught a whiff of the stable. If I 

 only dared to tell that fellow how to 

 marry! He might bring back from the 

 grave the soul of that ancestor. 



