very good-looking, well-bred person, did I not?” said he with a smile," and the girls very gay, and good-humoured, and very like other girls."

"O, more than that! Lady Augusta is very delightful, and your sisters,-how much more agreeable they are, for instance, than the Miss Millbanks.”

"Are they? yes, by-the-bye, the Miss Millbanks are very Scotch, indeed; but all Misses, Scotch or English, are pretty much alike.”

A house had been procured in Park Lane; Mrs St Clair thought it too magnificent, and too expensive; but Colonel Delmour approved of it, Lady Rossville admired it, and the house was taken. Then came equipages, horses, liveries, in short, an establishment, in which taste and splendour were alone consulted without any regard to the means, which indeed Gertrude herself believed to be inexhaustible, and which Delmour, with the reckless profusion of selfish extravagance, thought not about at all. Since Lady Rossville was to appear in the world, his only anxiety was that she should at the first, take her place at the head of the fashionable world; aware,

very

that if she once entered in an inferior grade, she

might not afterwards, even as his wife, be able to attain the proud pre-eminence of ton, which, of all pre-eminences, is the one most esteemed in the great world.

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Lady Augusta has kindly offered to introduce me to her milliner and jeweller, and all sorts of useful people," said Gertrude to him one day, -" and in the evening she proposes that mama and I should accompany her to the opera."

Colonel Delmour received this information rather dryly, and seemed to hesitate in his reply. At last he said "I have a great respect for Lady Augusta's good sense, and good intentions; but really her trades-people are so perfectly antediluvian, that you will oblige me by having nothing to do with them."

Gertrude was disposed to take this as a joke, but that she saw he was serious. "Lady Augusta does not dress in good taste," continued he

"and as for the girls, they can scarcely be said to have a taste at all—they stick themselves over with feathers, or flowers, or butterflies, or any thing that comes in their way.-Emily rather carries it off well; but poor Georgy looks as if her ornaments had been actually blown upon her."

"But how can I refuse so polite an offer?— and, besides, I don't know who are the people to employ."

"Leave all that to me, or rather to a friend of mine, Lady Charles Arabin, who comes to town to-morrow, and who I shall bring to visit you immediately."-Seeing Gertrude look surprised, he added—" She is not handsome, and is rather passée; but she has the best air and taste of any body in town-in fact, she gives the ton at present to every thing; and, therefore, I would rather that you took her as your guide, than Lady Augusta, that is, in all matters of mere taste and fashion."

"But I have a taste of my own in dress,” said Lady Rossville, half-displeased at the idea of being obliged to submit to the decision of another.

"And a perfect one," said Colonel Delmour; “but taste alone won't do without fashion. Venus herself, even attired by the Graces, would be thought maussade, were she to be introduced by a Duchess, who had been excluded from Almack's, or who had never supped at D- house.”

"Then, who can value the blind admiration

of the multitude ?" said Gertrude ;-" not I, indeed;—'tis much too paltry a triumph for me to take any trouble to acquire. I care not a straw for such empty distinctions, and would rather have the approbation of your mother, than of the whole fashionable world."

"What a word for you!" said Delmour laugh

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ing-" Approbation is a very good thing in itself, and a very useful school-word; but for you, Gertrude, with your charms and your graces to be approved of! No, you must be followed, admired, adored, worshipped."

"I am afraid 'tis in your imagination alone I stand any chance for being deified," said Gertrude smiling" so I shall certainly not start a candidate for immortal honours. I am not ambitious, Delmour, and shall be satisfied with your homage and true affections, since you will not allow me the approbation of your family."

"But I am proud, and vain, and ambitious of, and for you, dearest Gertrude," said Delmour gaily, "and must not suffer your partiality for me and my family to detract from the brilliancy of your star."

"But I would rather be introduced by them

than by any one else ;-if Lady Augusta does not mix much in society, there is your aunt, the Duchess of Burlington.

"Worse and worse," cried Delmour-" I would rather you never appeared at all, than have you brought out by her."

Why so?" asked Gertrude in some surprise "Is she not respectable ?"

Colonel Delmour could scarcely preserve his gravity at the question, as he replied-" Respectability, like approbation, is a thing of no account here it gives no consequence whatever to its possessor."

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Then, what precious gifts of nature, or acquirements of art, are they which do give consequence in this magic circle of yours?" said the Countess.

"That nameless je ne sai quoi which all admire, but none can define, and which unfortunately my highly respectable relations want. The Duchess is an excellent person in her way, but she is antiquated in her notions, dresses shockingly, gives parties where I should blush to be detected, and I should be undone were I to be seen offering her my arm in public.”