CHAPTER XI.
THE HERO ACQUITS HIMSELF HONOURABLY AS A COXCOMB .-- A FINE LADY OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY, AND A FASHIONABLE DIALOGUE; THE SUBSTANCE OF FASHIONABLE DIALOGUE BEING IN ALL CENTURIES THE SAME.
"I AM thinking, Morton," said my uncle, "that if you are to go to town, you should go in a style suitable to your rank.

What say you to flying along the road in my green and gold chariot?
'Sdeath! I'll make you a present of it.

Nay--no thanks; and you may have four of my black Flanders mares to draw you." "Now, my dear Sir William," cried Lady Hasselton, who, it may be remembered, was the daughter of one of King Charles's Beauties, and who alone shared the breakfast-room with my uncle and myself,--"now, my dear Sir William, I think it would be a better plan to suffer the Count to accompany us to town.

We go next week.

He shall have a seat in our coach, help Lovell to pay our post-horses, protect us at inns, scold at the drawers in the pretty oaths of the fashion, which are so innocent that I will teach them to his Countship myself; and unless I am much more frightful than my honoured mother, whose beauties you so gallantly laud, I think you will own, Sir William, that this is better for your nephew than doing solitary penance in your chariot of green and gold, with a handkerchief tied over his head to keep away cold, and with no more fanciful occupation than composing sonnets to the four Flanders mares." "'Sdeath, Madam, you inherit your mother's wit as well as beauty," cried my uncle, with an impassioned air.
"And his Countship," said I, "will accept your invitation without asking his uncle's leave." "Come, that is bold for a gentleman of--let me see, thirteen--are you not ?" "Really," answered I, "one learns to forget time so terribly in the presence of Lady Hasselton that I do not remember even how long it has existed for me." "Bravo!" cried the knight, with a moistening eye; "you see, Madam, the boy has not lived with his old uncle for nothing." "I am lost in astonishment!" said the lady, glancing towards the glass; "why, you will eclipse all our beaux at your first appearance; but--but--Sir William--how green those glasses have become! Bless me, there is something so contagious in the effects of the country that the very mirrors grow verdant.