ny misfortune which could happen to him,
or any souls alive? Cousin Warrington knew better. Always of a sceptical
turn, Mr. W. took a grim delight in watching the peculiarities of his
neighbours, and could like this one even though he had no courage and no
heart. Courage? Heart? What are these to you and me in the world? A man
may have private virtues as he may have half a million in the funds.
What we du monde expect is, that he should be lively, agreeable, keep a
decent figure, and pay his way. Colonel Esmond Warrington's grandfather
(in whose history and dwelling-place Mr. W. took an extraordinary
interest), might once have been owner of this house of Castlewood,
and of the titles which belonged to its possessor. The gentleman often
looked at the Colonel's grave picture as it still hung in the saloon,
a copy or replica of which piece Mr. Warrington fondly remembered in
Virginia.

"He must have been a little touched here," my lord said, tapping his own
tall, placid forehead.

There are certain actions, simple and common with some men, which others
cannot understand, and deny as utter lies, or deride as acts of madness.

"I do you the justice to think, cousin," says Mr. Warrington to his
lordship, "that you would not give up any advantage for any friend in
the world."

"Eh! I am selfish: but am I more selfish than the rest of the world?"
asks my lord, with a French shrug of his shoulders, and a pinch out of
his box. Once, in their walks in the fields, his lordship happening
to wear a fine scarlet coat, a cow ran towards him; and the ordinarily
languid nobleman sprang over a stile with the agility of a schoolboy. He
did not conceal his tremor, or his natural want of courage. "I dare say
you respect me no more than I respect myself, George," he would say, in
his candid way, and begin a very pleasant sardonical discourse upon the
fall of man, and his faults, and shortcomings; and wonder why Heaven
had not made us all brave and tall, and handsome and rich? As for Mr.
Warrington, who very likely loved to be king of his company (as some
people do), he could not help liking this kinsman of his, so witty,
graceful, polished, high-placed in the world--so utterly his inferior.
Like the animal in Mr. Sterne's famous book, "Do not beat me," his
lordship's look seemed to say, "but, if you will, you may." No man, save
a bully and coward himself, deals hardly with a creature so spiritless.

CHAPTER LXXIII. We keep Christma