about a dozen foreign orders dangling from his button-hole, I also frequently enjoy. He married Miss Culpepper, a young lady to whom I have had the honour of introducing the reader in the course of these Memoirs, but with whose good qualities I enjoyed no opportunity of becoming acquainted. By the death of her brother, who died from eating ice when heated by dancing at a ball, she succeeded to the estate of Culpepper Park, which Conyers now possesses in right of his wife. Age has somewhat moderated the extreme vivacity of his spirits, but by no means diminished his attachment to old friends; and our regard, begun in youth, is likely, if I may judge from my own feelings, to continue till death. Sir Charles and Lady Conyers are the gayest people in the county. No one rides better horses, or is a keener sportsman, than my old friend; no one drives a smarter equipage, or gives more splendid parties than her Ladyship. We are but sober people at Thornhill, yet Conyers always spends a fortnight with us about Christmas, a visit to which we make a regular return. William Lumley went some years ago to India as a Judge. He writes me, he is there engaged in a ponderous book on Indian Antiquities, with which he means to astonish the learned on his re turn to Europe. Lady Lyndhurst (I really beg pardon of the Lord Chancellor, but mine is the older creation) continues to fill that prominent station in the world of haut ton to which, by her rank, beauty, and talents, she is so eminently entitled. Since my marriage we have twice met, and she received me with the cordial welcome of an old friend. Though I have never ceased to feel a deep interest in her happiness, these meetings were not the cause of any very painful or violent emotions. The season of these has passed away; and when I gaze on Laura and my children, I can bend in grateful acquiescence to the decrees of Providence, and say, from the bottom of my heart, "It is better as it is." READER, it is time that the drama of my life should close. The curtain must now fall; and the puppets which, for your amusement, have strutted their little hour upon the stage, are about to vanish for ever from your view. If, in following the VOL. III. vicissitudes of my career, you have occasionally felt sympathy for my joys or sufferings, accept my thanks; and should your early days, like mine, have been overcast with storms, may these, too, pass away, and leave the sunset of your life serene and unclouded as that of CYRIL THORNTON. THE END. EDINBURGH: PRINTED BY JOHN JOHNSTONE, |