means neither more nor less than the wife of a beggarman; and, in these times, when there is such a tendency to a bad spirit amongst the people, and such an evident wish to bring down the higher ranks to a level with themselves, it becomes the duty of every gentleman to guard his privileges with a jealous

eye.

"I for one will certainly never give in to these liberty and equality notions, that I am determined.”

"I hope not, indeed," said the Major, warmed into fervour by the spirit of his lady,-"I hope not, in

deed.'

66

How," said the lady, can my servants possibly look up to me with proper respect, when I am brought upon a level with themselves?

"You are perfectly right, my dear, they cannot do it, it is impossible.'

"Perfectly-wife, indeed!"

Chapter lxxvj.

Leath we are to diseas or hurt your persone ony wayis, and far leather to want you.-Bannatyne's Journal.

TH

'HE dialogue was now at its lowest ebb, when Miss Pratt came pattering into the room full speed.

While this disturbance was going on in one room, Mrs St Clair was conversing with Mr Lyndsay in another on the subject of her daughter's pupilage; and Lady Rossville and Colonel Delmour found themselves together in the drawing-room, where they flattered themselves with enjoying an uninterrupted tête-à-tête. But within the drawing-room was a small turret, containing piles of music, porte-feuilles of drawings and

engravings, heaps of worsteds and sewing-silks, and, in short, a variety of miscellaneous articles, which the Countess had not yet had leisure to look over. This was a favourite haunt of Miss Pratt's, who was fond of picking and grubbing amongst other people's goods; not that she actually stole, but that, as she expressed it, she often met with bits of things that were of no use to any body, and which, when she showed to Lady Rossville, she always made her welcome to. For some time her head had been completely immersed in a large Indian chest, containing many oriental odds and ends, a few of which she had selected for the purpose of being hinted for, and she was just shaking her ears from the cobwebs they might have contracted in their researches, when they were suddenly smote with the sound of her own name pronounced by Colonel Delmour; she heard the Countess's voice in reply, but it was too soft and low to enable her to ascertain her words.

"Since Miss Pratt is disagreeable to you and odious to me, why don't you dismiss her the house, then?" asked Colonel Delmour.- "Much as you despise her, she may do mischief-Ah, Gertrude!"-But here Colonel Delmour's voice sunk into a tenderer strain, and its undistinguished accents only penetrated the massive door. which was betwixt them. Miss Pratt had met with many a buffet in her day, but she never had met with any thing like this, and her ears tingled with rage and mortification at hearing herself talked of in such a

manner.

"I wish Anthony Whyte heard him!" was her first mental ejaculation; though even to herself, had she considered a moment, the mortifying conviction must have been that if Anthony Whyte did hear it, it would only be to laugh at it. She tried to make out something more, which might prove either a confirma