when the gentlemen had had enough of politics and wine. The party assembled at Brock Hall, being exclusively of a political nature, ladies seldom formed part of the society there; and would possibly have been considered de trop, by several of Lord Seymour's political, parliamentary, and official friends; whose after-dinner conclaves were often prolonged to an extent, which, sooth to say, might have tired the patience of many of the fairer sex, endowed with more powers of endurance, than such as were possessed by the Lady Emily, or of listeners with more pretensions to a political bias, than Captain Harry Beresford could have claimed.

As the latter cared little for either politics or wine; Lord Seymour, who saw this illconcealed impatience, and was, perhaps, not sorry to dispense with his nephew's presence, at these political after-dinner dissertations; requested him, when he felt tired, never to stand on ceremony, but to leave them without hesitation, and join the ladies. This permission, the Captain never failed to avail himself of; more especially, as he found he could frequently thus

ensure a long and uninterrupted tête-à-tête with his beautiful cousin, when Lady Emily, from lassitude or indisposition, had retired for the night.

The word "cousin" possesses some mystic attribute, which, under the Platonic mask of near relationship, appears suddenly to place such relatives on terms of familiar intimacy, which months or years, might under other circumstances, have failed to bring about.

It is a treacherous and insinuating connexion, this "cousinship," against which young people of different sexes cannot be too strongly on their guard; often engendering a soi-disant brotherly and sisterly love that frequently oversteps the bounds of affection which brothers and sisters ought mutually to feel.

Tedious and lengthened as the after-dinner sittings had heretofore appeared; now that the Captain found himself so much more agreeably engaged, they always seemed to be most unseasonably brought to a close.

Nevertheless, brief as these frequent têtes

Harry Beresford became the most sympathising confidant; and we all know how nearly sympathy and confidence are akin to love!

The sequel is easy to be guessed. Harry Beresford loved and was beloved; and with such a prize in sight, the dashing young sailor secured it by a coup de main, and soon cast anchor in Matrimony's harbour-at Gretna Green.

Great was the consequent commotion at Brock Hall. The Lady Emily swooned away; Lord Seymour said nothing, but sternly bit his lip. He summoned his solicitor, disowned and disinherited his only child; who thus became the penniless and peerless wife of a half-pay "sea-captain," with an income of barely two hundred pounds a-year!

CHAPTER V.

EARLY YOUTH.

“Thus far, oh, friend! have I, though leaving much Unvisited, endeavoured to retrace

The simple ways in which my childhood walked."

WORDSWORTH.

I MUST now endeavour to condense as much as possible, the relation of those events, immediately following the marriage of Captain Harry Beresford, with his cousin Charlotte Seymour.

Lord Seymour never forgave his daughter. Lady Seymour, who had long been in a most precarious state of health, died shortly after this elopement; and on the death of Lord Seymour, who in the course of a few years followed her to