fiftieth
year she was still very handsome: she was also very accomplished, very
clever, and very kind-hearted, as some of such queens are; just one
of those women invaluable in forming the manners and elevating the
character of young men destined to make a figure in after-life. But she
was very angry with herself in thinking that she failed to arouse any
such ambition in the heir of the Chillinglys.

It may here be said that Kenelm was not without great advantages of form
and countenance. He was tall, and the youthful grace of his proportions
concealed his physical strength, which was extraordinary rather from the
iron texture than the bulk of his thews and sinews. His face, though it
certainly lacked the roundness of youth, had a grave, sombre, haunting
sort of beauty, not artistically regular, but picturesque, peculiar,
with large dark expressive eyes, and a certain indescribable combination
of sweetness and melancholy in his quiet smile. He never laughed
audibly, but he had a quick sense of the comic, and his eye would laugh
when his lips were silent. He would say queer, droll, unexpected things
which passed for humour; but, save for that gleam in the eye, he could
not have said them with more seeming innocence of intentional joke if he
had been a monk of La Trappe looking up from the grave he was digging in
order to utter "memento mori."

That face of his was a great "take in." Women thought it full of
romantic sentiment; the face of one easily moved to love, and whose love
would be replete alike with poetry and passion. But he remained as proof
as the youthful Hippolytus to all female attraction. He delighted the
Parson by keeping up his practice in athletic pursuits; and obtained a
reputation at the pugilistic school, which he attended regularly, as the
best gentleman boxer about town.

He made many acquaintances, but still formed no friendships. Yet every
one who saw him much conceived affection for him. If he did not return
that affection, he did not repel it. He was exceedingly gentle in voice
and manner, and had all his father's placidity of temper: children and
dogs took to him as by instinct.

On leaving Mr. Welby's, Kenelm carried to Cambridge a mind largely
stocked with the new ideas that were budding into leaf. He certainly
astonished the other freshmen, and occasionally puzzled the mighty
Fellows of Trinity and St. John's. But he gradually withdrew himself
much from general society. In fact, he was