 I believe one, and confess the other.—My brother has informed me of Lord Hume's misadventures at Naples; the particulars of which I shall not trouble you with at present, as they are nothing different from the too general pranks and hazards of youthful spirits, and may serve us better

to laugh at, on the first tête-a-tête we may ever have the pleasure of enjoying together.
I bestow a generous wish that Sir George's notion about this matter may prove true; that as he has not only seen, but felt, his folly and extravagance, he may be more likely to act prudently, for the rest of his life, than if he had never erred.
This is a maxim universally propagated, and may in some instances be true; but I can scarce think it a sufficient foundation for a woman of sense, to build her happiness on—To a man who has been accustomed to the artful blandishments of an abandoned woman, I should much fear that the delicate endearments of a

wife would appear as tasteless and insipid, as true wit to the epigrammatist, or the sweetest viand to the spiced palate.
But all this is merely matter of speculation, and of no manner of consequence to me; for Lord Hume has never yet attempted to pay me a visit, either at Paris, or here; and Sir George has not hitherto been in a situation to invite him, especially as, from a very proper delicacy, he has never acquainted him with the circumstances of Miss Colville's story; and though we set out from Paris at the same time, he kept different stages from us, all the way.
The account that my brother has just given me of that particular, is this, that they had agreed at Naples, to travel together

to England, but on their arrival at Paris, and his hinting to him that I had come to meet him there, on account of some singular piece of business or other, he had immediately estranged himself from any further connection with him; saying, after his lively manner, that as he looked upon himself to be in the nature of a redeemed knight, he thought it his bounden duty to attend his deliverer, in the quality of an humble 'squire, till he had escorted him safe into his own country; but should wait upon him at such a respectful and unprying distance, as might leave the privacy, both of his conversation and transactions, perfectly free from any manner of restraint.
My brother, you know, was abroad, when our affections commenced and

grew together, while I was
