nd so I
bowed, and said, "Algernon Sydney Potts."

"There are Staffordshire Pottses?"

"No relation," I said stiffly. It was Hammond who made the remark, and
with a sneering manner that I could not abide.

"Well, Mr. Potts, it is agreed," said Lord Keldrum, with his peculiar
urbanity, "we shall see you at eight No dressing. You'll find us in this
fishing-costume you see now."

I trust my reader, who has dined out any day he pleased and in any
society he has liked these years past, will forgive me if I do not enter
into any detailed account of my reasons for accepting this invitation.
Enough if I freely own that to me, A. S. Potts, such an unexpected honor
was about the same surprise as if I had been announced governor of a
colony, or bishop in a new settlement.

"At eight sharp, Mr. Potts."

"The next door down the passage."

"Just as you are, remember!" were the three parting admonitions with
which they left me.

CHAPTER III. TRUTH NOT ALWAYS IN WINE

Who has not experienced the charm of the first time in his life, when
totally removed from all the accidents of his station, the circumstance
of his fortune, and his other belongings, he has taken his place
amongst perfect strangers, and been estimated by the claims of his own
individuality? Is it not this which gives the almost ecstasy of our
first tour,--our first journey? There are none to say, "Who is this
Potts that gives himself these airs?" "What pretension has he to say
this, or order that?" "What would old Peter say if he saw his son
to-day?" with all the other "What has the world come tos?" and "What are
we to see nexts?" I say it is with a glorious sense of independence that
one sees himself emancipated from all these restraints, and recognizes
his freedom to be that which nature has made him.

As I sat on Lord Keldrum's left,--Father Dyke was on his right,--was I
in any real quality other than I ever am? Was my nature different, my
voice, my manner, my social tone, as I received all the bland attentions
of my courteous host? And yet, in my heart of hearts, I felt that if
it were known to that polite company I was the son of Peter Potts,
'pothecary, all my conversational courage would have failed me. I would
not have dared to assert fifty things I now declared, nor vouched for a
hundred that I as assuredly guaranteed. If I had had to carry about me
traditions of the shop in Mary's Abbey, the laboratory, and the rest of
it, how could I have ha