daughters to the inconvenience of giving up any engagements of your own, in order to accommodate me."

Well, my dear, I am sure it is impossible to say any thing against that, because it is just the sort of genteel politeness which every one would like to see in a young lady of your rank and fortune. And I suppose, my dear, that you are quite sure that you have money enough to pay for it?"

Had Mrs. Roberts said one single syllable expressive of anxiety lest her young inmate might attract attention, and be deemed indiscreet from the unprotected style in which she pursued her amusement, it might have gone far towards making the poor little girl more cautious in her proceedings, for there was no mixture of audacity in her courage, no wish for exemption from any restraint for which she could feel respect, but this allusion to her purse and its resources was most unfortunate. It offended and disgusted her in every way, and more than ever determined to assume the entire disposal of herself till she should be happy enough to be again within reach of advice and protection which she could recognise as fit and proper, she brought the conversation to an abrupt conclusion by saying,

"Till I have given you some reason for it, madam, you have no right to suppose me capable of contracting debts which I am unable to pay; and unless you wish me immediately to take measures for finding another home, you will do well to abstain from such interference with my conduct, as may render my present abode intolerable to me.”

"Dear me, Miss Harrington, I am sure I would not do any thing of the kind upon any account whatever; on the contrary, my dear, I make it quite a point of honour towards your dear aunt to render all things as agreeable to you as possible."

Such was the placable rejoinder of Mrs. Roberts, having quietly listened to which, Bertha left the room with the air of a young princess, graciously accepting an apology for some inadvertent offence offered to her greatness.

"Wont Master Edward bring her down a peg or two, I wonder?" said Mrs. Roberts to her daughters, as she concluded her description of the above scene.

"If he does not" replied Agatha, "he will richly deserve to be brought down himself."

CHAP. XLVII.

A SKILFUL pen, acting as a conductor to a tolerably observing mind, while engaged in ransacking Rome, might still find wherewithal to cover a good deal of paper in the genuine Corinne vein. But start not, gentle reader! No such hazardous attempt is about to be made here, either for your delectation or annoyance; it shall suffice to repeat that Bertha Harrington wearied not in the path she had chosen for herself, but persevered with an appetite that seemed to increase with what it fed on, in visiting and revisiting (and then coming back again to get another look) all the most cherished objects which that immortal museum contains.

Now, though it had been gravely debated in the Roberts family only a few short months before, whether Miss Harrington was handsome or ugly, though she had been strongly suspected during that interval of being little better than an idiot in capacity, and though, worst of all

perhaps, she dressed with no other object than to make herself as little conspicuous as possible, she nevertheless did not quite escape observation. Had she indeed been less lovely than she really was, the manner in which she was perpetually seen by those who had the same pursuits as herself, rambling in solitary enjoyment, and with no other protection than that afforded by an ordinary valet-de-place, from one end of Rome to the other, could scarcely fail of drawing a good deal more attention than she was at all aware of. But so utterly ignorant was Bertha of all that an acquaintance with the world can teach, and which nothing else can, that she felt as snugly secure as if she had been shut up in cotton; and as she rarely looked at any man or woman, except such as were made of marble, it did not occur to her that the more insignificant portion of the creation formed of clay might, by possibility, take it into their poor mortal heads to look at her. This oversight on her part was unfortunate, as it exposed her to much that it would have been desirable she should avoid.

More gay young eyes had looked at her, and more gay old ones too had taken the same direction than it is at all necessary to enumerate; one single anecdote will suffice to show to all whom it may concern, the danger of a young lady's fancying that she can take care of herself, without better assistance than that of a valet-de-place.

It happened that Bertha had worked up her fanciful young mind into a state of great enthusiasm for the Pantheon. There was something in its form and proportions in the unwonted manner in which "thoughts commercing with the skies," might be followed by eyes wishing to commerce with it also, as well as in the contrast between its past and present dedication, which drew her again and again beneath its beautiful dome, and often as she drove along the Via Sacra, she never failed to give it a fond look, which very often led to an affectionately long visit.

Twice had her accomplished valet-de-place followed her into the building, and twice followed her round it, reciting all the records concerning it, which it is so perfectly necessary for an unlearned lady to hear once, but so exceedingly annoying to listen to a second time. On her first visit she heard him with great attention, but during the second, her manner so evidently showed this intelligent official that his antiquarian lore was no longer required, that when she entered the building for the third time, he reposed himself on the step of the carriage as long as she stayed. This man, however, though professionally devoted to time past, was not so entirely withdrawn from time present as not to remark the singularity of his young mistress's mode of life. He had lived long enough in the world to know that when pretty young ladies are in the habit of appearing abroad without any protection at all, they are generally supposed to be living under the especial protection of some person in particular. Nor did this experienced individual stop here in his conjectures respecting his juvenile patroness. If the solitary carriage, together with the many Roman memorials, in the purchase of which she indulged herself, convinced him that she had one particular "friend," the remarkable manner in which she haunted St. Peter's, the Pantheon, the Vatican, and so forth, evidently (after her first visit to each), prefering his absence to his presence, convinced him quite as firmly, that she either had, or intended to have, more than one.

It was then in front of the majestic portico of her favourite Pantheon, that the following dialogue took place, which will show clearly enough the sort of position in which the heiress of Sir Christopher Harrington had contrived to place herself, while strenuously endeavouring, with what she believed to be very praiseworthy resolution, to find consolation in her independence, for the desolate exile in which she seemed doomed to live.

Luigi Mondorlo had not been reading his "Ariosto" on the step of Miss Harrington's carriage for above half an hour on the fourth day that he had attended her to this admired edifice, when a young Englishman of rather distinguished manner and appearance came out of it, and having looked with somewhat of a scrutinising glance at the equipage for a minute or two, addressed him in pretty good Italian to the following effect.

"I think I know your face, my good fellow. If I am not mistaken, you are just the sort of person I am looking after for a friend of mine. Are you likely to be long engaged with the lady you are attending upon

now ?"

Mondorlo looked up at him with the keen quick glance of an Italian eye, and more than half smiled as he replied, "How does the signor know that I am in attendance upon any lady at all?"

The young Englishman returned the glance and the smile too as he answered, "I believe you Italians think that no men have eyes but yourselves. But will you be pleased to answer my question ?"

66

Certainly," replied the man, rising, "to the best of my knowledge I will answer it. I intend to remain in my present situation as long as the lady requires my services. But how long that may be I do not know. When she dismisses me, it will be an honour to be employed by the signor."

"Very well then, you must give me your name and address," rejoined the Englishman, "that I may know how to get at you."

"Many thanks, signor. My name is Luigi Mondorlo, and I am always to be heard of at the English library in the Piazza di Spagna,” said the man.

Mr. Lawry, for such was his name, drew forth his tablets, and wrote the address.

"But how comes it, my good fellow," he resumed, "that such a clever, well-informed valet-de-place as you are, for I followed you and your party one day round the Vatican, how comes it, I say, that you should sit here amusing yourself with that queer-looking little book instead of attending the young lady round the Pantheon ?"

The man laughed. "She has been here so often, signor, that she has heard all I have got to say about it, and would be as tired of hearing it all over again, I suppose, as I should be of saying it,” he replied.

"What do you think makes her come here so often?" demanded Mr. Lawry.

"That is no business of mine," replied Luigi.

"Business? No, certainly. The answering such a question as mine has nothing very like business in it. But unless she pays you, and well too, for holding your tongue, she cannot reasonably expect that you should stand for hours together waiting upon her pleasure, without speak

ing a word to any one that passes by. But perhaps she does pay you well for keeping her secrets. Have I guessed rightly?" "She

"No, indeed, you have not, sir," replied the man, yawning. does not seem much to care who knows of her goings on. I never saw her pretend to make the least mystery or concealment about any thing she does, except just putting down her veil as she goes in and comes out of the places."

66

66

"Well, to be sure, that is strange enough," returned Mr. Lawry; "for of course, by your manner of speaking, you know that there are some things she does that she would not very well like every body to know." Why I have got no very good right to say so either," said the man, looking frankly up in the face of the questioner; “ only, you know, that when a young lady is living in the way that of course she lives in, the gentlemen they depend upon would not, in the general way, quite like that she should keep loitering about as this one does, in all the most quiet places. We don't want any conjurer to tell us how young ladies are amusing themselves when they do that.'

"What is the name of the gentleman she lives with ?" said Mr. Lawry. “I know not, on my word," replied the conscientious valet. "And I do not know her name either. She pays me every week herself, and I bring her the receipt for the carriage and horses too, and the buono mano to the coachman she gives herself. But I never had any occasion to ask for her name, or for that of the gentleman either-and so 1 never did, for I don't love English names, they are so difficult."

"Then it is an English gentleman she lives with?" said Mr. Lawry. "Why that I take to be a matter of course, sir, from the quantity of money she throws away in little bronzes and marbles, the miniature copies, you know, sir, of our great works. We never see that in any ladies that don't live under the protection of English gentlemen."

"And pray, my good Mr. Luigi Mondorlo," said the young Englishman, with sudden animation, "how do you know that she lives with any gentleman at all?"

The man laughed. "How do I know it?" he repeated. "You are a good many years younger than I am, signor, there is no doubt of that, and yet I should have thought you were old enough too to know that young ladies like my padrona do not wander about the churches, and galleries, and ruins, in the style she does, if they have any body to take care of them except the gentleman they live with, unless they are just married indeed, and don't choose to take any body about with them as yet. But that is not the case with my padrona, for the servants of the house always call her 'la signorina."

"But how comes it that you have never asked these servants of the house any thing about her? If you had done this, you would not be driven to so much guess-work as you seem to be present."

"Ecco!" exclaimed the man, laughing, "that is quite an English question, signor. The Roman people never think of making any inquiries of that sort. A gentleman may ask a lady a question, or a lady may ask a gentleman, for the private and particular satisfaction of either party, that is, provided they are not man and wife. But Rome would not be wide enough to contain its population if such sort of questions as you suggest were to be set going among them. We are a peaceable people, signor, in these later days, whatever we might be formerlypeaceable in all ways, whether it be his Holiness or the Emperor that Aug.-VOL. LXXIV. NO. CCXCVI.

2

takes the government of the country upon him, or this noble gentleman, or that, takes the government of a lady, the wisest among the Romans look the other way, and say nothing."

"That may be all very wise and very convenient for you,” replied the Englishman, condescendingly adopting the playful tone of the Italian, "but we manage all these matters very differently in our country."

"It may be so, signor," returned the valet-de-place, resuming his poetical studies. "But you will find if you stay long enough among us, that we understand all about the ladies, at least quite as well as you do; and that my pretty padrona is just the sort of young lady I take her to be, notwithstanding her looking as shy and as pale as a nun.'

"I dare say you are right, my fine Roman," returned Lawry, chucking half a scudo at him, and the young Englishman walked off, without a doubt in poor Bertha's favour remaining on his mind, but not without something like a sigh that an English woman, and with such a pair of eyes too, should so early have placed herself beyond the reach even of a conjecture that might save her from condemnation.