smile, the quick malignity of the grey eye, which though it sometimes rested calmly beneath the rather overhanging brow, was always so bright and cold that it reminded the beholder of polished steel. Mr. Benedict had very fine white teeth; possibly he smiled sometimes to show them, but the smile was a very bad one, and the teeth so large, that Rose Arlington, when a child, had likened them to those of the wolf who had devoured little Red Riding Hood.

Metaphorically speaking, and with the teeth of the law, Mr. Benedict had really devoured many an orphan child, and helpless widow too; but he still smiled-the smile was constant, but of "such a sort," that it would, upon the stage, have made Mr. Benedict an admirable representative of Mephistopheles. With all this, and though he was a man of low origin, Mr. Benedict, had perfectly the demeanour and manners of a gentleman. For many years past, Mr. Benedict had chosen to assume to himself the style and title of a "solicitor," in common with the great majority of his fellow attornies, who please themselves with the high sounding title to which they have no claim, since it is not in the Chancery court that they practise.

All the worse it was for the unfortunates who fell into the hands of Mr. Nicholas Benedict, that he was a person not only of gentlemanly manner and appearance, but of great legal acumen, and unquestionable general ability. His talents and his close acquaintance with the law were the very venom in the serpent's fang, for Mr. Benedict was a finished specimen of those dishonest, unprincipled lawyers, who stigmatize with their vices that profession which calls forth all the highest qualities of the most intellectual and honourable of men; for the sword of the law is alike potent

E

for evil or for good, according to the discretion of those who wield it.

It needs not here to detail what lamentable circumstance it was which threw the affairs of Richard Musgrave into the hands of Mr. Benedict; it may suffice for the present to say, that at the time when he was first introduced to Mr. Musgrave by the present Lord Allerdale, sixteen years before, he was still a plodding attorney, living with a large family in a suburb of London, and in want, at times, of the mere necessaries of life. Things had altered since then with Mr. Benedict; he had an elegant house in Eaton Square, and a villa at Wimbledon, and through the interest of Lord Allerdale he enjoyed a first-rate practice, and mingled in the first society.

Mr. Benedict had far too correct a conception of the demeanour of a real gentleman ever to be obtrusive or servile in his politeness; he was, however, really desirous of ingratiating himself with Ellinor, and after the usual compliments of meeting, he expressed his regret at having found Mr. Musgrave so much indisposed, with an earnestness of manner that might have been mistaken for sincerity.

"It would be well, sir!" answered Ellinor, with a severity of look and tone which might scarce have been expected from so young a person, "if you would show your consideration for my uncle's ill-health by sparing him some of the harassing details of business which I find so surely accompany your visits, that, consulting candour, and my uncle's peace, rather than an affected courtesy, I must tell you that I dread to hear your name announced."

"If it be merely for your uncle's sake that you regard my visits with so much horror, Miss Musgrave," responded the

lawyer, sharply, for in spite of himself he was irritated by the sarcasms of Ellinor, "I trust that in future my name will be less abhorrent to you. Whatever it may please you to think, young lady, I can assure you that it has ever been my most earnest care to spare not only Mr. Musgrave's feelings, but your own, and it is not my fault if the present exigency of his affairs compels me to enter into details with you, which may not, perhaps, prove altogether agreeable. It is due to myself, however, to observe, that I have not been insensible to this unjust aversion of yours, nor shall I deny that I have felt wounded at such a misconception on the part of a young lady whose feelings I have been most anxious to spare, or that your conduct has much lessened the pain I should have otherwise felt at being compelled to make to you the disclosures that are now inevitable."

Young as she was, Ellinor Musgrave had an instinctive knowledge of character, and she had fully understood that of the lawyer; but she wanted the discretion which years can alone bestow, and she enjoyed his irritation at the moment when it should have alarmed her; the smile with which she listened to Mr. Benedict was infinitely provoking. Very different, however, was the effect of the lawyer's last words upon her uncle. Suddenly starting from his fit of melancholy abstraction, he gazed wildly round the room; then his eye fixed on Benedict, and he murmured in a broken voice, “Ah, what does all this mean? disclosures-Benedict, are you mad?—and yet, what disclosures ?-What can be disclosed at which we need to fear?-And as for me, have I ever wilfully imagined harm towards any living creature?—you know I have not, Benedict, and those only can fear disclosures who have guilt to be disclosed."