"But how came the invitation?" asked Con stance, "and to such a man? Believe me it gives me no pleasure.” "Such a man!" exclaimed De Vere: “Is it thus you talk of your own near kinsman, the monarch of fashion, and as I have been told by Clayton "Mr. Clayton again!” "Yes, Clayton: who declares that during the single month of your reign after you were presented last spring, no one ever made so many conquests, and no conquest so illustrious as that of Lord Cleveland." Mor Serious or jesting, Constance seemed far from being pleased with this tone of her cousin, and Lady Eleanor herself begged him to put an end to it, by saying how things really were. timer complied, and it seemed, that Lord Mowbray had really employed his nephew to send the invitation we have mentioned. But I fear much ground must be gone over ere we can set this matter before the reader in all the perspicuity we wish. For Lord Cleveland had encouraged a sort of intimacy with De Vere, (or rather he had given him an opening to one if he pleased) even from the days of his emerging from the confine ment of the moated house. His lordship thought he might make what he called a pretty fellow, and from his connection with him, was, at one time, even willing to produce him in the world; an advantage of which few but knew the benefit, and which all aspiring young men envied, but of which, some how or another, De Vere did not profit, as it was said he ought to have done. Lord Cleveland, however, as much the senior in age, had sometimes favoured him with instructions both in politics and supreme bon ton; of which last, as De Vere had said, he was the undisputed sovereign. He had even now and then written to him with easy friendliness. Probably, he might have had other motives for this than appeared in the letters themselves. But be that as it will, both the friendship and the correspondence languished, and was only occasionally revived. Lord Cleveland, however, is much too important and too decided a personage to be introduced to the reader at the end of a chapter; or, indeed, any where but in a chapter of his own. We therefore close the present one to open in another, perhaps the most illustrious character of our whole biography. CHAPTER XX. A MAGNIFICO OF THE FIRST CLASS. The Duke is marvellous little beholden to your report. SHAKSPEARE. Sir, I commend you to your own content. He that commends me to my own content, SHAKSPEARE. THE Earl of Cleveland was a cousin, only some once or twice removed from the Earl of Mowbray, who, through his mother, derived a very considerable proportion of his estates from the Cleveland family. Sprung from one of the most powerful and ancient lineages of the kingdom, he ranked, if not first, yet among the very first of the nobility; and to this he added a fortune, which indulgent as he was to a very magnificent taste, he knew well how to preserve. It was observed, indeed, that however great his expences, they were all of a personal nature, instruments of his power, or of his pleasures; and that no great public institution, or national establishment, and still less that private charities, had ever benefited by his vast wealth. He was endowed with great and comprehensive talents: had a shrewdness and reach of understanding which few could equal, and which was well turned to account, both on the turf and at the card-table, as well as in the closet, not merely of the minister, but of the highest personage of the realm. This, and a very active propensity to party politics, had made him, though not at present in the administration, all-powerful with the minister. It was said, indeed, that he rode the administration (as he certainly did their subalterns) with a hard and heavy curb, which he seldom relaxed, till he carried whatever object he had before him. In doing this, he had not unfrequently changed his line of action, and was court to-day or country to-morrow, with a most fearless contempt of the animadversions to which such conduct exposed him. Nor did this proceed from meanness, so much as from the absolute loftiness of his spirit, which laughed at the fear of offending any one, since to every one he thought himself superior. It was whispered that his advances towards De Vere were occasioned by his knowledge of the family interest that was to return him to parliament; being very intent, and losing no opportunity where he could make one, of enlisting young men among his followers. And in this, though of a proud and repulsive spirit, neither birth, nor figure, nor high sense of integrity, such as De Vere's, were the chief considerations that swayed him; his object being political influence, no matter through whom. Thus ambition might be said to have been his greatest passion, had it not held a divided empire with another, which governed him quite as strongly, and, indeed, absorbed more of his time we mean a devotion to the fair. It is inconceivable with what eagerness he pursued this; into how many engagements it plunged him; how many emissaries it forced him to employ, and what expences-but no! we should wrong his prudence if we did not confess that eager as he was to gratify his wishes in this respect, he never suffered them to surprise him into any thing like what he called a profligate profusion. And yet, to speak of the person of the magmifico, an eye observer would look in vain for |