mirer of excitement? But there was Lady
Aphrodite; yet that must end. Alas! on his part, it had commenced in
levity; he feared, on hers, it must terminate in anguish. Yet, though he
loved his cousin; though he could not recall to his memory the woman
who was more worthy of being his wife, he could not also conceal from
himself that the feelings which impelled him were hardly so romantic as
he thought should have inspired a youth of one-and-twenty when he mused
on the woman he loved best. But he knew life, and he felt convinced that
a mistress and a wife must always be different characters. A combination
of passion with present respect and permanent affection he supposed to
be the delusion of romance writers. He thought he must marry Caroline,
partly because he must marry sooner or later; partly because he had
never met a woman whom he had loved so much, and partly because he felt
he should be miserable if her destiny in life were not, in some way or
other, connected with his own. 'Ah! if she had but been my sister!'

After a little more cogitation, the young Duke felt much inclined to
make his cousin a Duchess; but time did not press. After Doncaster he
must spend a few weeks at Cleve, and then he determined to come to
an explanation with Lady Aphrodite. In the meantime, Lord Fitz-pompey
secretly congratulated himself on his skilful policy, as he perceived
his nephew daily more engrossed with his daughter. Lady Caroline, like
all unaffected and accomplished women, was seen to great effect in the
country.

There, while they feed their birds, tend their flowers, and tune their
harp, and perform those more sacred, but not less pleasing, duties which
become the daughter of a great proprietor, they favourably contrast with
those more modish damsels who, the moment they are freed from the Park
and from Willis's, begin fighting for silver arrows and patronising
county balls.

September came, and brought some relief to those who were suffering in
the inferno of provincial ennui; but this is only the purgatory to the
Paradise of _battues_. Yet September has its days of slaughter; and
the young Duke gained some laurels, with the aid of friend Egg, friend
Purdy, and Manton. And the Premier galloped down sixty miles in one
morning. He sacked his cover, made a light bet with St. James on the
favourite, lunched standing, and was off before night; for he had only
three days' holiday, and had to visit Lord Protest, Lord Content, and