ered by this, that white roses made the same approximation to sobriety in dress, that three tables made to it in cards. "Seriously though," continued Lady Bab, "you must and shall go and buy some of Fanny's flowers. I need only tell you, it will be the greatest charity you ever did, and then I know you won't rest till you have been. A beautiful girl maintains her dying mother by making and selling flowers. Here is her direction," throwing a card on the table. "Oh no, this is not it. I have forgot the name, but it is within two doors of your hair-dresser, in what d'ye call the lane, just out of Oxford-street. It is a poor miserable hole, but her roses are as bright as if they grew in the gardens of Armida." She now rung the bell violently, saying she had overstaid her time, though she had not been in the house ten minutes.

Next morning I attended Lady Belfield to the exhibition. In driving home through one of the narrow passages near Oxfordstreet, I observed that we were in the street were the poor flowermaker lived. Lady Belfield directed her footman to inquire for the house. We went into it, and in a small but clean room, up three pair of stairs, we found a very pretty and very genteel young girl at work on her gay manufacture. The young woman presented her elegant performances with an air of uncommon grace and modesty.

She was the more interesting, because the delicacy of her appearance seemed to proceed from ill health, and a tear stood in her eye while she exhibited her works. You do not seem well, my dear,' said Lady Belfield, with a kindness which was natural to her. 'I never care about my own health, Madam,' replied she, but I fear my dear mother is dying.' She stopped, and the tears which she had endeavoured to restrain now flowed plentifully down her cheeks. 'Where is your mother, child?' said Lady Belfield. In the next room, Madam.' 'Let us see her,' said her Ladyship, if it won't too much disturb her.' So saying, she led the way, and I followed her.

We found the sick woman lying on a little poor, but clean bed, pale and emaciated, but she did not seem so near her end as Fanny's affection had made her apprehend. After some kind expressions of concern, Lady Belfield inquired into their circumstances, which she found were deplorable. But for that dear girl, Madam, I should have perished with want,' said the good woman; our misfortunes I have had nothing to support me but what she earns by making these flowers. She has ruined her own health, by sitting up the greatest part of the night to procure me necessaries, while she herself lives on a crust.'

'since

I was so affected with this scene, that I drew lady Belfield into the next room: if we cannot preserve the mother, at least let us save the daughter from destruction,' said I: you may command my purse. I was thinking of the same thing,' she replied.

But my

Pray, my good girl, what sort of education have you had?'—' O, Madam,' said she, one much too high for my situation. parents, intending to qualify me for a governess, as the safest way of providing for me, have had me taught every thing necessary for that employment. I have had the best masters, and I hope I have not misemployed my time.' How comes it then,' said I, that you were not placed out in some family? What, Sir! and leave my dear mother helpless and forlorn? I had rather live only on my tea and dry bread, which indeed I have done for many months, and supply her little wants, than enjoy all the luxuries in the world at a distance from her.'

What were your misfortunes occasioned by?' said I, while Lady Belfield was talking with the mother. One trouble followed another, Sir,' said she, but what most completely ruined us, and sent my father to prison, and brought on a paralytic stroke on my mother, was his being arrested for a debt of seven hundred pounds. This sum, which he had promised to pay, was long due to him för laces, and to my mother for millenery and fancy dresses, from a lady who has not paid it to this moment, and my father is dead, and my mother dying! this sum would have saved them both!'

She was turning away to conceal the excess of her grief, when a venerable clergyman entered the room. It was the rector of the parish, who came frequently to administer spiritual consolation to the poor woman. Lady Belfield knew him slightly, and highly respected his character. She took him aside, and questioned him as to the disposition and conduct of these people, especially the young woman. His testimony was highly satisfactory. The girl, he said, had not only had an excellent education, but her understanding and principles were equally good. He added, that he reckoned her beauty among her misfortunes. It made good people, afraid to take her into the house, and exposed her to danger from those of the opposite description.

I put my purse into Lady Belfield's hands, declining to make any present myself, lest, after the remark he had just made, I should incur the suspicions of the worthy clergyman.

We promised to call again the next day, and took our leave, but not till we had possessed ourselves of as many flowers as she could spare. I begged that we might stop and send some medical assistance to the sick woman, for though it was evident that all relief was hopeless, yet it would be a comfort to the affectionate girl's heart to know that nothing was omitted which might restore her mother.

CHAP. XII.

IN the evening we talked over our little adventure with Sir John, who entered warmly into the distresses of Fanny, and was inclined to adopt our opinion, that if her character and attainments stood the test of a strict inquiry, she might hereafter probably be transplanted into their family as governess. We were interrupted in the formation of this plan by a visit from Lady Melbury, the acknowledged queen of beauty and of ton. I had long been acquainted with her character, for her charms and her accomplishments were the theme of every man of fashion, and the envy of every modish woman.

She is one of those admired but pitiable characters, who, sent by Providence as an example to their sex, degrade themselves into a warning. Warm-hearted, feeling, liberal on the one hand; on the other vain, sentimental, romantic, extravagantly addicted to dissipation and expense, and with that union of contrarieties which distinguishes her, equally devoted to poetry and gaming, to liberality and injustice. She is too handsome to be envious, and too generous to have any relish for detraction, but she gives to excess into the opposite fault. As Lady Denham can detect blemishes in the most perfect, Lady Melbury finds perfections in the most depraved. From a judgment which cannot discriminate, a temper which will not censure, and a hunger for popularity, which can feed on the coarsest applause, she flatters egregiously and universally, on the principle of being paid back usuriously in the same coin. Prodigal of her beauty, she exists but on the homage paid to it from the drawing-room at St James's to the mob at an election. Candour in her is as mischievous as calumny in others, for it buoys up characters which ought to sink. Not content with being blind to the bad qualities of her favourites, she invents good ones for them, and you would suppose her corrupt little senate' was a choir of seraphims.

A recent circumstance related by Sir John was quite characteristical. Her favourite maid was dangerously ill, and earnestly begged to see her lady, who always had loaded her with favours. To all company she talked of the virtues of poor Toinette, for whom she not only expressed, but felt real compassion. Instead of one apothecary who would have sufficed, two physicians were sent for; and she herself resolved to go up and visit her, as soon as she had finished setting to music an elegy on the death of her Java Sparrow. Just as she had completed it, she received a fresh entreaty to see her maid, and was actually got to the door in order to go up stairs, when the milliner came in with such a distracting variety of beautiful new things, that there was no possibility of Ietting them go till she had tried every thing on, one after the

The

other. This took up no little time. To determine which she should keep and which return, where all was so attractive, took up still more. After numberless vicissitudes and fluctuations of racking thought, it was at length decided she should take the whole. milliner withdrew; the lady went up-Toinette had just expired. I found her manners no less fascinating than her person. With all her modish graces, there was a tincture of romance and an appearance of softness and sensibility which gave her the variety of two characters. She was the enchanting woman of fashion, and the elegiac muse.

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Lady Belfield had taken care to cover her work-table with Fanny's flowers, with a view to attract any chance visitor. Lady Melbury admired them excessively. You must do more than admire them,' said Lady Belfield, you must buy and recommend' She then told her the affecting scene we had witnessed, and discribed the amiable girl who supported the dying mother by making these flowers. It is quite enchanting,' continued she, resolving to attack Lady Melbury in her own sentimental way, to see this sweet girl twisting rosebuds, and forming hyacinths into bouquets' Dear, how charming! exclaimed Lady Melbury; it is really quite touching. I will make a subscription for her, and write at the head of the list a melting description of her case. She shall bring me all her flowers, and as many more as she can make. But no, we will make a party, and go and see her. You shall carry me. How interesting to see a beautiful creature making roses and hyacinths! her delicate hands and fair complexion must be amazingly set off by the contrast of the bright flowers. If it were a coarse looking girl spinning hemp, to be sure one should pity her, but it would not be half so moving. It will be delightful. I will call on you tomorrow, exactly at two, and carry you all. Perhaps,' whispered sbe to Lady Belfield, 'I may work up the circumstance into a sonDo think of a striking title for it. On second thoughts, the sonnet shall be sent about with the subscription, and I'll get a pretty vignette to suit it.'

net.

That fine creature,' said Sir John, in an accent of compassion, as she went out, was made for nobler purposes. How grievously does she fall short of the high expectations her early youth had raised! Oh! what a sad return does she make to providence for his rich and varied bounties! Vain of her beauty, lavish of her money, careless of her reputation; associating with the worst company, yet formed for the best; living on the adulation of parasites, whose understanding she despises! I grieve to compare what she is with what she might have been, had she married a man of spirit, who would prudently have guided and tenderly have restrained her. He has ruined her and himself by his indifference and easiness of temper Satisfied with knowing how much she is admired and he en wied, he never thought of reproving or restricting her. He is

proud of her, but has no particular delight in her company; and trusting to her honour, lets her follow her own devices, while he follows his. She is a striking instance of the eccentricity of that bounty which springs from mere sympathy and feeling. Her charity requires stage effect; objects that have novelty, and circumstances which, as Mr. Bayes says, elevate and surprise.' She lost, when an infant, her mother, a woman of sense and piety; who, had she lived, would have formed the ductile mind of the daughter, turned her various talents into other channels, and raised her character to the elevation it was meant to reach.'

How melancholy a consideration is it,' said I, that so superior a woman should live so much below her high destination! She is doubtless utterly destitute of any thought of religion.'

'You are much mistaken,' replied Sir John, I will not indeed venture to pronounce that she entertains much thought about it; but she by no means denies its truth, nor neglects occasionally to exhibit its outward and visible signs. She has not yet completely forgotten

All that the nurse and all the priest have taught.

I do not think that, like Lady Denham, she considers it as a commutation, but she preserves it as a habit. A religious exercise, however, never interferes with a wordly one. They are taken up in succession, but with this distinction, the worldly business is to be done, the religious one is not altogether to be left undone. She has a moral chemistry which excels in the amalgamation of contradictory ingredients. On a Sunday at Melbury castle, if by any strange accident she and her lord happen to be there together, she first reads him a sermon, and plays at cribbage with him the rest of the evening. In town one Sunday when she had a cold, she wrote a tract on the sacrament, for her maids, and then sat up all night at deep play. She declared if she had been successful she would have given her winnings to charity: but as she lost some hundreds, she said, she could now with a safe conscience borrow that sum from her charity purse, which she had hoped to add to it, to pay her debt of honour.'

Next day, within two hours of her appointed time, she came, and was complimented by Sir John on her punctuality. Indeed,' said she, 'I am rather late, but I met with such a fascinating German novel, that it positively chained me to my bed till past three. I assure you I never lose time by not rising. In the course of a few winters I have exhausted half Hookham's catalogue, before some of my acquaintance are awake, or I myself out of bed.'

We soon stopped at the humble door of which we were in search. Sir John conducted Lady Melbury up the little winding stairs. I assisted Lady Belfield. We reached the room, where Fanny was