it is now, and how infinitely prettier it must be in spring-time thickly powdered over with dainty forest flowers, when I put my foot into a rabbit hole, and take a breathless header into space. Lord St. John picks me up without a smile, likewise my hat, which has ambitiously flown far beyond my head, like a rider who clears a fence while his horse remains behind. Goëthe says men show their character in nothing more clearly than in what they think laughable. Now Lord St. John does not even smile, whereas if I had seen him meet with the same accident I should have laughed immoderately for five minutes. There is no one behind to mark my confusion, so, as one's misfortunes are always bearable when there is no one by to observe them, I put on my hat with unruffled serenity and proceed on my way.
What a dull little lord this is! It is lucky that he does not, like other mortals, depend on "the quantity of sense, wit, or good manners he brings into society for the reception he meets with in it." He is neither handsome, nor wise, nor witty, yet he will never know the lack of good looks, wisdom, or sense; he will pass over the heads of men better in every way than himself, only they are born with wooden ladles in their mouths and he with a silver one.
Here we are at last. The white cloth on the grass commends itself favourably to my eyes, and the twinkling silken calves of the footmen, as they go hither and thither, look festive and cool. I sit down with a sigh of relief, and Paul Vasher comes to my side and sits down too. Sir George flies to Silvia, Milly to Fane; the sisters, alas! to the Captains—it is a general post. I wonder what Paul and Silvia have been talking about: there is no expression on her face; on his there is a great deal, as he looks at me. I have hardly dared to seek to learn its meaning yet—hardly ventured to put out a trembling hand to touch the skirt of a mantle of great joy. . . .
Everybody is sitting down now, and finding by painful expe-
