the last 'infirmity of noble minds'? I know you think me foolish and unpractical, and will tell me mine is an impossible standard; but I don't believe in impossible standards where public morality is concerned. At all events, let us make some attempt in an upward direction; and as a first step I propose to banish from the vocabulary that most pernicious of all words, 'A Career.'"

She stopped, with eyes sparkling and cheeks flushed; by the way, I did not before remark, for I only now discovered, that she was lovely—"wholly worldly"—what sacrilege! say rather "barely mortal;" and I forthwith instituted a new category. My own ideas, thought I, expressed in feminine language; she is converted already, and stands in no need of a missionary. Grandon himself could not take higher ground; as I thought of him I looked up, and found his eyes fixed upon us. "My friend Grandon would sympathise most cordially in your sentiments," I said, generously; for I had fallen a victim in preparing the ground; I had myself tumbled into the pit which I had dug for her; for had I not endeavoured to entrap her by expressing the most unworthy opinions, in the hope that by assenting to them she would have furnished me with a text to preach upon?

"Yes," she replied, in a low tone, and with a slight tremor in her voice, "I know what Lord Grandon's views are, for he was staying with us at Broadhem a few weeks ago, and I heard him upon several occasions discussing the subject with my brother."

"Failed to convert him, though, it would appear," said I, thinking what a delightful field for missionary operations Broadhem House would be. "Perhaps I should be more successful. Grandon wants tact. Young men sometimes require very delicate handling."

"So do young women," said Lady Ursula, laughing. "Will you please look under the table for my fan?" and away sailed the ladies, leaving me rather red from having got under the table, and very much in love indeed.

I was roused from the reverie into which I instantly fell by Dickiefield telling me to pass the wine, and asking me if I knew my next neighbour. I looked round and saw a young man with long flaxen hair, blue eyes, and an unhealthy complexion, dexterously impaling pieces of apple upon his knife, and conveying them with it to his mouth. "Mr Wog," said Dickiefield, "let me introduce you to Lord Frank Vanecourt."

"Who did you say, sir?" said Mr Wog, in a strong American accent, without taking the slightest notice of me.

"Lord Frank Vanecourt," said Dickiefield.

"Lord Frank Vanecourt, sir, how do you do, sir?—proud to make your acquaintance, sir," said Mr Wog.

"The same to you, sir," said I. "Pray, where were you raised?" I wanted to show Mr Wog that I was not such a barbarian as he might imagine, and knew how to ask a civil question or two.

"Well, sir, I'm a Missouri man," he replied. "I was a captain under Frank Blair, till I was taken bad with chills and fever; then I gave up the chills and kept the fever—'oil-fever' they call it down to Pithole—you've heard of Pithole?"

"Yes," I said, I had heard of that magical city.

"Well, just as I struck oil, one of your English lords came over there for the purpose of what he called 'getting up petroleum' and we were roommates in the same hotel for some time, and got quite friendly; and when he saw my new kerosene lamp, and found I was coming to have it patented in this country, he promised to help me to get up a Patent Lamp Company, and gave me letters to some of your leading aristocracy; so, before leaving, I saw the President, and told him I would report on the state of feeling in your highest circles about our war. We know what it is in your oppressed classes, but it aint every one has a chance, like me, of finding out how many copperheads there are among your lords. My father, sir, you may have heard of by name—Appollonius T. Wog, the founder, and, I may say, the father of the celebrated 'Pollywog Convention,' which was named after him, and which unfortunately burst up just in time to be too late to save our country from bursting up too."

I expressed to Mr Wog my condolences on the premature decease of the Pollywog Convention, and asked him how long he had been in England, and whom he had seen.

"Well, sir," he said, "I have only been here a few days, and I have seen considerable people; but none of them were noblemen, and they are the class I have to report upon. The Earl of Broadhem, here, is the first with whom I have conversed, and he informs me that he has just come from one of your universities, and that the sympathies of the great majority of your rising youth are entirely with the North."

"You may report to your Government that the British youth of the present day, hot from the university, are very often prigs."

"Most certainly I will," said Mr Wog; "the last word, however, is one with which I am not acquainted."

"It is an old English term for profound thinker," I replied.

Mr Wog took out a pocket-book, and made a note; while he was doing so, he said, with a sly look, "Have you an old English word for 'quite a fine gurl'?"

"No," I said; "they are a modern invention."

"Well, sir, I can tell you the one that sat 'twixt you and me at dinner would knock the spots out of some of our 'Sent' Louis belles."

In my then frame of mind the remark caused me such acute pain that I plunged into a conversation that was going on between Grandon and Dickiefield on the present state of our relations with Brazil, and took no further notice of Mr Wog for the rest of the evening; only, as my readers may possibly hear more of him in society during this season, I have thought it right to introduce him to them at once.

We all went to hear Broadhem's speech next day, and whatever might have been our private opinion upon the matter, we all, with the exception of Grandon and Lady Ursula, warmly congratulated him upon it afterwards. John Chundango and Joseph Caribbee Islands both made most effective speeches, but we did not feel the least called upon to congratulate them: they each alluded with great affection to the heathen and to Lord Broadhem. Chundango drew a facetious contrast between his lordship and an effeminate young Eastern prince, which was highly applauded by the audience that crowded the town-hall of Gullaby; and Joseph made a sort of grim joke about the probable effect of the "Court of Final Appeal" upon the theological tenets of the Caribbee Islanders, that made Lady Broadhem cough disapprobation, and everybody else on the platform feel uncomfortable. I confess I have rather a weakness for Joseph. He has a blunt off-hand way of treating the most sacred topics, that you only find among those who are professionally familiar with the subject. There is something refreshingly muscular in the way he lounges down to the smoking-room in an old grey shooting-coat, and lights the short black meerschaum, which he tells you kept off fever in the Caribbee Islands, while the smoke loses itself in the depths of his thick beard, which he is obliged to wear because of his delicate throat. There is a force and an ease in his mode of dealing with inspiration at such a moment which you feel must give him an immense ascendancy over the native mind.

He possesses what may be termed a dry ecclesiastical humour, differing entirely from Chundango's, whose theological fun takes rather the form of Scriptural riddles, picked up while he was a catechist. Neither he nor Broadhem smoke, so we had Wog and the Bishop to ourselves for half an hour before going to bed. "You must come and breakfast with me some morning in Piccadilly to meet my interesting friend Brother Chrysostom, my lord," said I.

I always like to give a bishop his title, particularly a missionary bishop; it is a point of ecclesiastical etiquette about which I have heard that the propagators of Christianity were very particular.

"If you will allow me, sir, I will join the party," said Mr Wog, before the Bishop could reply; "and as I don't know where Piccadilly is, I'll