Edward felt too well convinced of his influence to doubt the poffibility of his acquiring the glittering prize upon his own terms; and he sketched in his mind the only conditions upon which he would confent to give the lady the honour of his name. Thefe conditions were remarkable for nothing but their being a direct contradiction to lady Madelina's plan. But on his first conversation with lady Arabella upon the fubject, he discovered that he had greatly mistaken her character when he attributed to it any degree of pliability in pecuniary matters. She, indeed, loved to fquander with thoughtless profufion; but that very love of fquandering fuggefted the propriety of retaining the power of doing fo; and the lovers parted with great mutual diffatisfaction: Edward, convinced K 5 convinced that his merits would confer honour upon any lady on whom he beftowed his hand; and lady Arabella, perfuaded that a younger brother has no right to expect a higher office than to be his wife's fteward, if he be fo lucky as to engage the good opinion of a woman of fortune. Both seemed inclined to bring their matrimonial pretenfions to a fresh market. He thought that his perfon might attract fome fair one equally rich and lefs mercenary ; and she knew, that when people calculate upon good matches, there is always as great a difference between prefent poffeffion and reverfionary expectation, as there is between the comparative fplendor of a baronial and a ducal coronet. The gentleman pondered upon the propriety of discontinuing his addreffes; but the lady haftened his deliberations by informing him, that if his vifits at Portland-place were upon her account, fhe begged fhe might not in future interrupt his important avocations; and thus Mr. Fitzofborne was fuddenly reduced to the fituation of a rejected fwain, a condition which the verfatility of his talents knew how to improve. Lady Arabella's frivolity, felfishness, and avowed expectation of making fuperior conquefts, did not difcredit the tale which Fitzofborne told of his difmiffion. Monteith's character took fire at his fifter's evident dereliction of the principles of honour, conftancy, and female delicacy; and the reluctance with which the fpecious Edward appeared to difcover her caprice, irritated his ardent temper ftill more. He charged her with bafe infidelity and grofs indecorum; and the evaded the charge by urging, K 6 The blunt integrity of lord that that he was a free independent being, and accountable to no one for her actions, which were the refult of her opinions; and no one had any right to fcrutinize the opinions of others. The earl raved against this heterodox doctrine, becaufe it militated against his wifh of fupremacy, without discovering that there was a degree of ingratitude in the application of these principles against the interest of the master from whom he had acquired them; and her ladyship refolved never to mislead her husband by furnishing a previous inftance of her fubmiffion to her brother's authority. She removed on the very evening of the difpute to the house of lord viscount Fitzofborne. In order to explain the reafon of her choosing that asylum, I must unriddle a little Machiavelian policy. The fituation of the noble houfe of Fitzofborne was become become fo very precarious in point of credit, that the representative of its honours, like Shakspeare's Percy, had long "caft many a northern look to fee the Frazer bring up his powers." The illuftrious viscount indeed could not give himself a legal title to that spacious inheritance which now centered in lady Arabella; but his fraternal wish of tranfferring it to his own family was not quite difinterested. Edward had ever appeared too abftracted, too generous, and too fuperior to low mercenary views, to deny a brother the loan of a few thousands, and his indifference to money was in the viscount's opinion the cause of his prefent difappointment; for had his whole heart been engroffed by the defire of advancing his fortune, the pretty bird might have beat her gay plumage in ufelefs vexation, at finding herself |
