of my way? why don't you-Heaven help me!" and she stamped her little foot quite seriously on the floor. "A pretty person for a lover you are!"

"Oho! then I am a lover, you acknowledge ?" "Nonsense! get a chair next me at supper."

The young Godolphin was perfectly fascinated by the lively actress; and it was with no small interest that he stationed himself the following night in the stage-box of the little theatre at ***, to see how his Fanny acted. The house was tolerably well filled, and the play was "She Stoops to Conquer." The male parts were, on the whole, respectably managed; though Percy was somewhat surprised to observe that a man, who had joined the corps that morning, blessed with the most solemn countenance in the world-a fine Roman nose, and a forehead like a sage's-was now dressed in nankeen tights, and a coat without skirts, splitting the sides of the gallery in the part of Tony Lumpkin. But into the heroine Fanny Millinger threw a grace, a sweetness, a simple yet dignified spirit of true love, that at once charmed and astonished all present. The applause was unbounded; and Percy Godolphin felt proud of himself for having admired one whom every one else seemed also resolved upon admiring.

When the comedy was finished he went behind the scenes, and for the first time felt the rank which intellect bestows. This idle girl, with whom he had before been so familiar; who had seemed to him, boy as he was, only made for jesting, and coquetry, and trifling, he now felt to be raised to a sudden eminence that startled and abashed him. He became shy and awk ward, and stood at a distance stealing a glance towards her, but without the courage to approach and compli ment her.

The quick eye of the actress detected the effect she had produced. She was naturally pleased at it, and, coming up to Godolphin, she touched his shoulder, and with a smile rendered still more brilliant by the rouge yet unwashed from the dimpled cheeks, said, “Well,

most awkward swain! no flattery ready for me? Go to! you won't suit me: get yourself another empress !"

"You have pleased me into respecting you," said Godolphin.

There was a delicacy in the expression that was very characteristic of the real mind of the speaker, though that mind was not yet developed; and the pretty actress was touched by it at the moment, though, despite the grace of her acting, she was by nature far too volatile to think it at all advantageous to be respected on the long run. She did not act in the afterpiece, and Godolphin escorted her home to the inn.

So long as his ten guineas lasted-which the reader will conceive was not very long-Godolphin stayed with the gay troop as the welcome lover of its chief ornament. To her he confided his name and history: she laughed heartily at the latter, for she was one of Venus's true children, fond of striking mirth out of all subjects. "But what," said she, patting his cheek affectionately," what should hinder you from joining us for a little while? I could teach you to be an actor in three lessons. Come now, attend! It is but a mere series of tricks, this art that seems to you so admirable."

Godolphin grew embarrassed. There was in him a sort of hidden pride that could never endure to subject itself to the censure of others. He had no propensity to imitation, and he had a strong susceptibility to the ridiculous. These traits of mind, thus early developed-which in later life prevented his ever finding fit scope for his natural powers, which made him too proud to bustle and too philosophical to shine— were of service to him on this occasion, and preserved him from the danger into which he might otherwise have fallen. He could not be persuaded to act: the fair Fanny gave up the attempt in despair. "Yet stay with us," said she, tenderly, "and share my poor earnings."

Godolphin started; and in the wonderful contradic

tions of the proud human heart, this generous offer from the poor actress gave him a distaste, a displeasure, that almost reconciled him to parting from her. It seemed to open to him at once the equivocal mode of life he had entered upon. “No, Fanny," said he, after a pause, "I am here because I resolved to be independent: I cannot, therefore, choose dependance." "Miss Millinger is wanted instantly for rehearsal," said the little girl who acted fairies and old women, putting her head suddenly into the room.

"Bless me!" cried Fanny, starting up; "is it so late? Well, I must go now. Good-by! look in upon us-do."

But Godolphin, moody and thoughtful, walked into the street; and, lo! the first thing that greeted his eyes was a handbill on the wall, describing his own person, and offering twenty guineas reward for his detention. "Let him return to his afflicted parent," was the conclusion of the bill," and all shall be forgiven."

Godolphin crept back to his apartment; wrote a long, affectionate letter to Fanny; enclosed her his watch, as the only keepsake in his power; gave her his address at Saville's; and then, waiting till dark, once more sallied forth, and took a place on the mail for London. He had no money for his passage, but his appearance was such that the coachman readily trusted him; and the next morning at daybreak he was under Saville's roof.

CHAPTER VI.

PERCY GODOLPHIN THE GUEST OF SAVILLE. HE ENTERS THE LIFE-GUARDS, AND BECOMES DU BON TON.

"AND so," said Saville, laughing, "you really gave them the slip: excellent! But I envy you your adventures with the player-folk. Gad! if I were some

years younger, I would join them myself; I should act Sir Pertinax Macsycophant famously; I have a touch of the mime in me. Well! but what do you propose to do? Live with me? eh!"

"Why, I think that might be the best, and certainly it would be the pleasantest, mode of passing my life. But-"

"But what?"

66

Why, I can scarcely quarter myself on your courtesy; I should soon grow discontented. So I shall write to my father, whom I, kindly and considerately, by-the-way, informed of my safety the very first day of my arrival in B****. I told him to direct his letters to your house; but I regret to find that the handbill which so frightened me from my propriety is the only notice he has deigned to take of my whereabout. I shall write to him, therefore, again, begging him to let me enter the army. It is not a profession I much fancy; but what then? I shall be my own master."

"Very well said!" answered Saville; "and here I hope I can serve you. If your father will pay the lawful sum for a commission in the Guards, why, I think I have interest to get you in for that sum alone—no trifling favour.”

tion.

Godolphin was enchanted at this proposal, and instantly wrote to his father, urging it strongly upon him; Saville, in a separate epistle, seconded the mo"You see," wrote the latter, "you see, my dear sir, that your son is a wild, resolute scapegrace. You can do nothing with him by schools and coercion: put him to discipline in the king's service, and condemn him to live on his pay. It is a cheap mode, after all, of providing for a reprobate; and as he will have the good fortune to enter the army at so early an age, by the time he is thirty he may be a colonel on full-pay. Seriously, this is the best thing you can do with him, unless you have a living in your family."

The old gentleman was much discomposed by these letters and by his son's previous elopement. He could not, however, but foresee that, if he resisted the boy's

wishes, he was likely to have a troublesome time of it. Scrape after scrape, difficulty following difficulty, might ensue, all costing both anxiety and money. The present offer furnished him with a fair excuse for ridding himself, for a long time to come, of farther provision for his offspring; and now growing daily more and more attached to the indolent routine of solitary economies in which he moved, he was glad of an opportunity to deliver himself from future interruption, and surrender his whole soul to his favourite occupation.

At length, after a fortnight's delay and meditation, he wrote shortly to Saville and his son; saying, after much reproach to the latter, that if the commission could really be purchased at the sum specified, he was willing to make a sacrifice, for which he must pinch himself, and conclude the business. This touched the son, but Saville laughed him out of the twinge of good feeling; and very shortly afterward Percy Godolphin was gazetted as a cornet in the Life Guards.

The life of a soldier, in peace, is indolent enough, Heaven knows! Percy liked the new uniforms and the new horses-all of which were bought on credit. He liked his new companions; he liked balls; he liked flirting; he did not dislike Hyde Park from four o'clock till six; and he was not very much bored by drills and parade. It was much to his credit in the world that he was the protégé of a man who had so great a character for profligacy and gambling as Augustus Saville; and, under such auspices, he found himself launched at once into the full tide of " good Bociety."

Young, romantic, high-spririted-with the classic features of an Antinous, and a very pretty knack of complimenting and writing verses-Percy Godolphin soon became, while yet more fit in years for the nursery than the world, "the curled darling" of that wide class of highborn women who have nothing to do but to hear love made to them, and who, all artifice themselves, think the love sweetest which springs from the most natural source. They like boyhood when it is