, in truth, none other than that precocious marvel of England who
but a year before had taken the breath from the House of Commons, and
had sent his fame flying over the Channel and across the wide Atlantic;
the talk of London, who set the fashions, cringed not before white
hairs, or royalty, or customs, or institutions, and was now, at one and
twenty, Junior Lord of the Admiralty--Charles James Fox. His face was
dark, forbidding, even harsh--until he smiled. His eyebrows were heavy
and shaggy, and his features of a rounded, almost Jewish mould. He put
me in mind of the Stuarts, and I was soon to learn that he was descended
from them.

As he entered the room I recall remarking that he was possessed of the
supremest confidence of any man I had ever met. Mrs. Manners he greeted
in one way, Mr. Marmaduke in another, and Mr. Walpole in still another.
To Comyn it was "Hello, Jack," as he walked by him. Each, as it were,
had been tagged with a particular value.

Chagrined as I was at the interruption, I was struck with admiration.
For the smallest actions of these rare men of master passions so compel
us. He came to Dorothy, whom he seemed not to have perceived at first,
and there passed between them such a look of complete understanding that
I suddenly remembered Comyn's speech of the night before, "Now it is
Charles Fox." Here, indeed, was the man who might have won her. And yet
I did not hate him. Nay, I loved him from the first time he addressed
me. It was Dorothy who introduced us.

"I think I have heard of you, Mr. Carvel," he said, making a barely
perceptible wink at Comyn.

"And I think I have heard of you, Mr. Fox," I replied.

"The deuce you have, Mr. Carvel!" said he, and laughed. And Comyn
laughed, and Dorothy laughed, and I laughed. We were friends from that
moment.

"Richard has appeared amongst us like a comet," put in the ubiquitous
Mr. Manners, "and, I fear, intends to disappear in like manner."

"And where is the tail of this comet?" demanded Fox, instantly; "for I
understood there was a tail."

John Paul was brought up, and the Junior Lord of the Admiralty looked
him over from head to toe. And what, my dears, do you think he said to
him?

"Have you ever acted, Captain Paul?"

The captain started back in surprise.

"Acted!" he exclaimed; "really, sir, I do not know. I have never been
upon the boards."

Mr. Fox vowed that he could act: that he was sure of it, from the
captain's appearance.