knowing the countess well, my lord,' replied the
professor, 'and can bear testimony to the nobleness of her nature and
disposition. I have known many, many instances of it.'

With such conversation as this, the professor and his noble boarder--for
such was the young man whom we have just introduced to the
reader--entered the house. Who this young man was, and what was his
object in taking up his abode with Professor Lockerby, we will explain
in a few words, although such explanation is rendered in part nearly
unnecessary by the conversation just recorded between him and the
professor. It may not be amiss, however, to say, in more distinct terms,
that he was the Earl of Wistonbury, a rank which he had attained just a
year before, by the sudden and premature death of his father, who died
in the forty-fifth year of his age. Since his accession to the title of
his ancestors, the young earl had continued to live in retirement with
his mother, a woman of a noble, elevated, and generous soul, well
becoming her high lineage--for she, too, was descended of one of the
noblest families in England--but in whose temper there was occasionally
made visible a dash of the leaven of aristocracy.

On her son, the young earl, her only surviving child, she doted with all
the affection of the fondest and tenderest of mothers; and well worthy
was that son of all the love she could bestow. His was one of those
natures which no earthly elevation can corrupt, no factitious system
deprive of its innate simplicity.

The promotion of the young earl to the head of his illustrious house,
was, however, a premature one in more respects than one. One of these
was to be found in the circumstance of the young man's being found
unprepared--at least so he judged himself--in the matter of education,
to fill with credit the high station to which he was so unexpectedly
called. His education, in truth, had been rather neglected; and it was
to make up for this neglect, to recover his lost ground with all the
speed possible, that he was now come to reside for a few months with
Professor Lockerby, who had once acted as tutor in his father's family
to a brother who had died young.

Such, then, was the professor's boarder, and such was the purpose for
which he became so.

The favourable impression which the youthful earl's first appearance had
made, suffered no diminution by length of acquaintance. Mild and
unpresuming, he won the love of all who came in conta