"Alas, poor girl!" said I, "I fear that her happiness will hang upon a slender thread. But suppose we change the conversation: first, because the subject is so meagre, that we might easily wear it out, and secondly, because such jests may come home. I am not very corpulent myself."

"Bah!" said Vincent, "but at least you have bones and muscles. If you were to pound the poor secretary in a mortar, you might take him all up in a pinch of snuff."

"Pray, Vincent," said I, after a short pause, "did you ever meet with a Mr. Thornton, at Paris ?"

"Thornton, Thornton," said, Vincent, musingly; "what, Tom Thornton ?"

“I should think, very likely," I replied; "just the sort of man who would be Tom Thorntonhas a broad face, with a colour, and wears a spotted neckcloth Tom-what could his name be but

Tom ?"

"Is he about five-and-thirty ?" asked Vincent,

"rather short, and with reddish coloured hair and

whiskers ?”

"Precisely," said I, "are not all Toms alike ?"

66

Ah," said Vincent, "I know him well; he is a clever, shrewd, fellow, but a most unmitigated rascal. He is the son of a steward in Lancashire, and received an attorney's education; but being a humorous, noisy fellow, he became a great favourite with his father's employer; who was a sort of Mecenas to cudgel players, boxers, and horse jockies. At this house, Thornton met many persons of rank, but of a taste similar to their host's, and they, mistaking his vulgar coarseness for honesty, and his quaint proverbs for wit, admitted him into their society. It was with one of them, that I have seen him. I believe of late, that his character has been of a very indifferent odour; and whatever has brought him among the English at Paris- those white-washed abominations- those 'innocent blacknesses,' as Charles Lamb calls chimney sweepers, it does not argue well for his

professional occupations.

I should think, how

ever, that he manages to live here; for wherever there are English fools, there are fine pickings for an English rogue."

"Ay," said I, "but are there enough fools here, to feed the rogues?"

"Yes, because rogues are like spiders, and eat each other, when there is nothing else to catch; and Tom Thornton is safe, as long as the ordinary law of nature lasts, that the greater knave preys on the lesser, for there cannot possibly be a greater knave than he is. If you have made his acquaintance, my dear Pelham, I advise you most soberly to look to yourself, for if he doth not steal, beg, or borrow of you, Mr. Howard de Howard will grow fat, and even Mr. Aberton cease to be a fool. And now, most noble Pelham, farewell. Il est plus aisé d'être sage pour les autres que de l'être pour soi-même."

CHAPTER XXI.

This is a notable couple-and have met

But for some secret knavery!

The Tanner of Tyburn.

I HAD now been several weeks in Paris, and I was not altogether dissatisfied with the manner in which they had been spent. I had enjoyed myself to the utmost, while I had, as much as possible, combined profit with pleasure; viz. if I went to the opera in the evening, I learned to dance in the morning; if I drove to a soirée at the Duchesse de Perpignan's, it was not till I had fenced an hour at the Salon des Assauts d'Armes; and if I made love to the duchess herself, it was sure to be in a position I had been a whole week in ac

quiring from my master of the graces; in short, I took the greatest pains to complete my education. I wish all young men who frequented the Continent for that purpose, could say the same.

One day (about a week after the conversation with Vincent, recorded in my last chapter) I was walking slowly along one of the paths in the Jardin des Plantes, meditating upon the various excellencies of the Rocher de Cancale and the Duchesse de Perpignan, when I perceived a tall man, with a thick, rough coat, of a dark colour (which I recognized long before I did the face of the wearer) emerging from an intersecting path. He stopped for a few moments, and looked round as if expecting some one. Presently a woman, apparently about thirty, and meanly dressed, appeared in an opposite direction. She approached him; they exchanged a few words, and then, the woman taking his arm, they struck into another path, and were soon out of sight. I suppose that the reader has already discovered that this man was Thornton's companion in the Bois de Boulogne, and the