ldom pay any; then, whether I do much
or not, I have generally plenty to do; then again, I so dearly love to
do nothing; then, summer or winter, the weather is commonly too cold
for an open carriage, and I am eminently a catch-cold person; so that
between wind and rain, business and idleness, no lady in the county with
so many places that she ought to go to, goes to so few: and yet it was
from the extraordinary event of my happening to leave home three days
following, that my present mystification took its rise. Thus the case
stands.

Last Thursday morning, being the 23rd day of this present month of
June, I received a note from my kind friend and neighbour, Mrs. Dunbar,
requesting very earnestly that my father and myself would dine that
evening at the Hall, apologising for the short notice, as arising out
of the unexpected arrival of a guest from London, and the equally
unexpected absence of the General, which threw her (she was pleased to
say) upon our kindness to assist in entertaining her visitor. At seven
o'clock, accordingly, we repaired to General Dunbar's, and found
our hostess surrounded by her fine boys and girls, conversing with a
gentleman, whom she immediately introduced to us as Mr. Thompson.

Mr. Thompson was a gentleman of about----

Pshaw! nothing is so unpolite as to go guessing how many years a man may
have lived in this most excellent world, especially when it is perfectly
clear, from his dress and demeanour, that the register of his birth
is the last document relating to himself which he would care to see
produced.

Mr. Thompson, then, was a gentleman of no particular age; not quite so
young as he had been, but still in very tolerable preservation, being
pretty exactly that which is understood by the phrase an old beau.
He was of middle size and middle height, with a slight stoop in the
shoulders; a skin of the true London complexion, between brown and
yellow, and slightly wrinkled: eyes of no very distinct colour; a nose
which, belonging to none of the recognised classes of that many-named
feature, may fairly be called anonymous; and a mouth, whose habitual
mechanical smile (a smile which, by the way, conveyed no impression
either of gaiety or of sweetness) displayed a set of teeth which did
great honour to his dentist. His whiskers and his wig were a capital
match as to colour; and altogether it was a head calculated to convey a
very favourable impression of the different artists employed in g