all places of public resort he attended on Lady

Castlenorth; sat by her at the upper end of the table to carve for her; and acted as a sort of gentleman usher to the mother, while he treated the daughter with the most profound reverence and respect.
This gentleman was three or four and thirty. His face was handsome, and his figure, though large, uncommonly fine. He had seen a great deal of service and of the world; spoke all European languages except English, well, and with all the animation of a Frenchman, had enough of the national character still about him, to mark him for an Irishman.
He was, indeed, sufficiently proud of his country, and piqued himself on being descended from the kings of Leinster; and Lord Castlenorth, to whom he contrived to render himself agreeable by a patient attention to long stories, by his knowledge of genealogy, by picking up for him old books of heraldry, and understanding the difference between a pale lozengy, and a pale engrailed*; and affixing some importance

to the enquiry, whether one of the quarterings of the arms of Fitz-Hayman, should in strictness be on field argent, a boar's head, couped gules, or couped Or*. Lord Castlenorth, among other doubts on this and equally important subjects with which he amused himself, sometimes considered whether the genealogy of Captain Cavanaugh might not be traced back in Ireland a generation or two beyond his own in Normandy, a circumstance which excited his respect, and gave, in his opinion, weight and value to those qualities by which the Captain contrived to render himself, throughout the family, so very acceptable.
Willoughby had seen him with them once or twice abroad, but had not then particularly noticed him among that croud of all nations and descriptions which Lady Castlenorth contrived to collect around her there. He now saw him, not without a slight degree of surprise, domesticated in the family; but his whole attention seemed to be given to the elder members of it; and

he hardly ever spoke to Miss Fitz-Hayman, who, when Willoughby one day took occasion to remark that he was on a footing of greater intimacy than formerly, answered, with something like a careless sneer—"Oh you know that Cavanaugh has long been my mother's great favourite."
In the societies of London, however, this intimacy became the subject of some malicious comments; and Lady Molyneux, who seldom let any thing of that sort escape her, could not forbear indulging herself in some remarks on Lady Castlenorth's friendship, even before her brother, who gave