nd disciplined
order in the world if a man yielded to a woman's pleadings in any matter
of business between man and man." From this it will be seen that
Mr. Lethbridge had overrated the value of Cecilia's alliance in the
negotiation respecting Mrs. Bawtrey's premium and shop.

CHAPTER III.

IF, having just perused what has thus been written on the biographical
antecedents and mental characteristics of Leopold Travers, you, my dear
reader, were to be personally presented to that gentleman as he now
stands, the central figure of the group gathered round him, on his
terrace, you would probably be surprised,--nay, I have no doubt you
would say to yourself, "Not at all the sort of man I expected." In that
slender form, somewhat below the middle height; in that fair countenance
which still, at the age of forty-eight, retains a delicacy of feature
and of colouring which is of almost womanlike beauty, and, from the
quiet placidity of its expression, conveys at first glance the notion of
almost womanlike mildness,--it would be difficult to recognize a man who
in youth had been renowned for reckless daring, in maturer years more
honourably distinguished for steadfast prudence and determined purpose,
and who, alike in faults or in merits, was as emphatically masculine as
a biped in trousers can possibly be.

Mr. Travers is listening to a young man of about two and twenty, the
eldest son of the richest nobleman of the county, and who intends to
start for the representation of the shire at the next general election,
which is close at hand. The Hon. George Belvoir is tall, inclined to be
stout, and will look well on the hustings. He has had those pains taken
with his education which an English peer generally does take with the
son intended to succeed to the representation of an honourable name and
the responsibilities of high station. If eldest sons do not often make
as great a figure in the world as their younger brothers, it is not
because their minds are less cultivated, but because they have less
motive power for action. George Belvoir was well read, especially
in that sort of reading which befits a future senator,--history,
statistics, political economy, so far as that dismal science is
compatible with the agricultural interest. He was also well-principled,
had a strong sense of discipline and duty, was prepared in politics
firmly to uphold as right whatever was proposed by his own party, and
to reject as wrong whatever w