a
name. Many a poor wretch who is worn out now and old, and bankrupt of fame and
money too, has commenced life at any rate with noble views and generous schemes,
from which weakness, idleness, passion, or overpowering hostile fortune has
turned him away. But a girl of the world, bon Dieu! the doctrine with which she
begins is that she is to have a wealthy husband; the article of faith in her
catechism is, »I believe in elder sons, and a house in town, and a house in the
country!« They are mercenary as they step fresh and blooming into the world out
of the nursery. They have been schooled there to keep their bright eyes to look
only on the prince and the duke, Croesus and Dives. By long cramping and careful
process, their little natural hearts have been squeezed up, like the feet of
their fashionable little sisters in China. As you see a pauper's child, with an
awful premature knowledge of the pawn-shop, able to haggle at market with her
wretched halfpence, and battle bargains at hucksters' stalls, you shall find a
young beauty, who was a child in the schoolroom a year since, as wise and
knowing as the old practitioners on that exchange, as economical of her smiles,
as dexterous in keeping back or producing her beautiful wares, as skilful in
setting one bidder against another, as keen as the smartest merchant in Vanity
Fair.
    If the young gentlemen of the Life Guards Green who were talking about Miss
Newcome and her suitors were silent when Clive appeared amongst them, it was
because they were aware not only of his relationship to the young lady, but his
unhappy condition regarding her. Certain men there are who never tell their
love, but let concealment, like a worm in the bud, feed on their damask cheeks;
others, again, must be not always thinking but talking about the darling object.
So it was not very long before Captain Crackthorpe was taken into Clive's
confidence, and through Crackthorpe very likely the whole mess became acquainted
with his passion. These young fellows, who had been early introduced into the
world, gave Clive small hopes of success, putting to him, in their downright
phraseology, the point of which he was already aware - that Miss Newcome was
intended for his superiors, and that he had best not make his mind uneasy by
sighing for those beautiful grapes which were beyond his reach.
    But the good-natured Crackthorpe, who had a pity for the young painter's
conditions, helped him so far (and gained Clive