"I met you where I never thought
To meet the like with you;
And tenderly you looked on me

With that deep eye of blue."

"Ah! that's it exactly," interrupted Mrs. Poggleton; "that's very nice-pray go on."

"I love you, dearest, full as well
As ere I loved you yet;

But still the time, when you had two,

I never can forget.

"Your eye is bright, and clear and soft,
An eye to make one feel-
You know I always try to see,
Your sweet face in profile.

"And yet that envious rocket-stick
Has filled me with regret;

For oh! the time before it fell,
I never can forget."

Here Peregrine Pultuney burst into such an ungovernable fit of laughter, that Mr. Clay was unable to proceed, and Mrs. Poggleton began to surmise that there was something absurd in the verses she was listening to, though as they had the right sentimental twang, she could not help thinking that they were very pretty. She, however, declaimed against young men, and declared that they were always playing tricks, and that she should quarrel with Mr. Clay if he was so silly; whereupon that gentleman sat down and wrote a few really sentimental verses, which had already done duty in the albums of considerably more than half his acquaint

ance. This little act pacified Mrs. Poggleton, and the morning soon glided away. The gentlemen were asked to stay to tiffin; but both of them were either engaged or said they were, and so they departed about half-past one, very much to the satisfaction of Mrs. Poggleton, who had not the least intention that either of them should accept the invitation which she thought herself bound in gratitude to tender.

CHAPTER X.

Containing several Live Lions—and sundry very instructive Observations upon a vast number of interesting Subjects.

THE few next days were demolished by our hero in a variety of very pleasant occupations, such aspaying visits, going to church,* spending money, and kissing his cousin. With regard to the first of these matters, as Peregrine had brought out with him a prodigious packet of waste-paper under the name of introductory letters, he thought himself bound, a few days after arrival, to do what the sailors call "overhaul them." He had not forgotten what old Mr. Havethelacks had told him about the utter inutility of the epistolary nuisances (nuisances alike to the deliverer and receiver), but as his father had taken a great deal of trouble to collect them for him, and as he did not know that they might not

*It is a remarkable fact that a novel-writer's week never by any chance contains a Sunday. Gentlemen of the craft go on "next-day"-ing eight or ten times, without ever running foul of a Sabbath.

every one of them contain private intelligence, he thought himself bound to deliver them, even at the risk of receiving a considerable measure of highbred impertinence in return. Peregrine Pultuney was proud enough, that is to say he had a very proper horror of being patronized; but he was not one of those shrinkingly sensitive heroes, who are agonized at the bare thought of a cold look, a haughty gesture, or an insolent rebuff. He did not know what it was to stand abashed in the presence of any living creature; and yet he was far from presuming-he knew his station as well as any body, but when he saw that others either forgot their own or what was due to his, as a gentleman, he threw off his modesty and forbearance, and in expressive phraseology, "took a rise out of" his arrogant acquaintance. All this too he did with the utmost good humour; for he was more inclined to laugh than to growl, even at the very moment that he was applying the lash. He never let his temper get the better of him; he neverbut we must go on with our story; and content ourselves with giving a finishing stroke to this little idiosyncratical portrait, by summing up in all comprehensive language, and describing Peregrine as a cool hand.

So one morning after breakfast, just as Julia was settling herself to her carpet-work, Peregrine Pultuney made his appearance in the drawingroom with a large packet of letters in his hand.

Seating himself beside Julia at the round table, he untied the string that confined the packet, and scattered the letters over the surface of the mahogany. "Now, Julia," he said, "you must tell me about all these people."

"What people?" asked Julia Poggleton.

"The people to whom these letters are addressed," replied Peregrine Pultuney, "what am I to do with so many?"

"Oh!" said Julia, " you must either deliver or send them. If you were quite sure that they were only letters of introduction, I would say put them into the fire-I mean, Peregrine, into the rubbish basket; but, as very likely, the people, who have written them, have only made a convenience of you, I suppose that there is every probability of some, at least, of them containing more about the writer's affairs a great deal, than about yours. But let me see to whom are they addressed?"

"Number one," returned Peregrine, promptly, "to the Right Honourable Lord William Cabbagedish Beanstick, Governor-general of India, &c. &c. Number two, to ditto. Number three, ditto, ditto. Pray what must I do with these?"

"Why," replied Julia, "you must give them to the aide-de-camp in waiting-whom you will find always, I believe, in a down-stairs room in the Government-house-I suppose, you do not want an

interview."

"Oh! dear no," replied Peregrine, "I have no