sked off to a convent just as she was ready to fall into my arms;
on another occasion, when a rich widow of the Low Countries was about to
make me lord of a noble estate in Flanders, comes an order of the police
which drives me out of Brussels at an hour's notice, and consigns my
mourner to her chateau. But at X---I had an opportunity of playing a
great game: and had won it too, but for the dreadful catastrophe which
upset my fortune.

In the household of the Hereditary Princess there was a lady nineteen
years of age, and possessor of the greatest fortune in the whole duchy.
The Countess Ida, such was her name, was daughter of a late Minister and
favourite of his Highness the Duke of X---and his Duchess, who had done
her the honour to be her sponsors at birth, and who, at the father's
death, had taken her under their august guardianship and protection. At
sixteen she was brought from her castle, where, up to that period, she
had been permitted to reside, and had been placed with the Princess
Olivia, as one of her Highness's maids of honour.

The aunt of the Countess Ida, who presided over her house during her
minority, had foolishly allowed her to contract an attachment for her
cousin-german, a penniless sub-lieutenant in one of the Duke's foot
regiments, who had flattered himself to be able to carry off this rich
prize; and if he had not been a blundering silly idiot indeed, with the
advantage of seeing her constantly, of having no rival near him, and the
intimacy attendant upon close kinsmanship, might easily, by a private
marriage, have secured the young Countess and her possessions. But
he managed matters so foolishly, that he allowed her to leave her
retirement, to come to Court for a year, and take her place in the
Princess Olivia's household; and then what does my young gentleman do,
but appear at the Duke's levee one day, in his tarnished epaulet and
threadbare coat, and make an application in due form to his Highness,
as the young lady's guardian, for the hand of the richest heiress in his
dominions!

The weakness of the good-natured Prince was such that, as the Countess
Ida herself was quite as eager for the match as her silly cousin,
his Highness might have been induced to allow the match, had not the
Princess Olivia been induced to interpose, and to procure from the
Duke a peremptory veto to the hopes of the young man. The cause of this
refusal was as yet unknown; no other suitor for the young lady's hand