respecting her for her constitutional
health and brightness, and regretting for the sake of the country that
she had not married to give England men and women resembling her. On the
whole he considered her wiser in her prescription for the malady
besetting him than his uncle. He knew that action was but a temporary
remedy. College would have been his chronic medicine, and the old lady's
acuteness in seeing it impressed him forcibly. She had given him a
peaceable two days on the Upper Thames, in an atmosphere of plain good
sense and just-mindedness. He wrote to thank her, saying:

'My England at sea will be your parlour-window looking down the grass to
the river and rushes; and when you do me the honour to write, please tell
me the names of those wildflowers growing along the banks in Summer.' The
old lady replied immediately, enclosing a cheque for fifty pounds:
'Colonel Halkett informs me you are under a cloud at Steynham, and I have
thought you may be in want of pocket-money. The wild-flowers are
willowherb, meadow-sweet, and loosestrife. I shall be glad when you are
here in Summer to see them.'

Nevil despatched the following: 'I thank you, but I shall not cash the
cheque. The Steynham tale is this:

I happened to be out at night, and stopped the keepers in chase of a
young fellow trespassing. I caught him myself, but recognized him as one
of a family I take an interest in, and let him run before they came up.
My uncle heard a gun; I sent the head gamekeeper word in the morning to
out with it all. Uncle E. was annoyed, and we had a rough parting. If you
are rewarding me for this, I have no right to it.'

Mrs. Beauchamp rejoined: 'Your profession should teach you subordination,
if it does nothing else that is valuable to a Christian gentleman. You
will receive from the publisher the "Life and Letters of Lord
Collingwood," whom I have it in my mind that a young midshipman should
task himself to imitate. Spend the money as you think fit.'

Nevil's ship, commanded by Captain Robert Hall (a most gallant officer,
one of his heroes, and of Lancashire origin, strangely!), flew to the
South American station, in and about Lord Cochrane's waters; then as
swiftly back. For, like the frail Norwegian bark on the edge of the
maelstrom, liker to a country of conflicting interests and passions, that
is not mentally on a level with its good fortune, England was drifting
into foreign complications. A paralyzed Minister proclaimed