stern enthusiast as the miserable recreations of Mammon and the world. There seemed every probability that Ernest Maltravers would die in a madhouse or, at best, succeed to the delusions without the cheerful intervals of Cowper. CHAPTER XV. “Sagacious, bold, and turbulent of wit, Restless--unfixed in principles and place.”--DRYDEN. “Whoever acquires a very great number of ideas interesting to the society in which he lives, will be regarded in that society as a man of abilities.”--HELVETIUS. IT was just when Ernest Maltravers was so bad that he could not be worse that a young man visited Temple Grove. The name of this young man was Lumley Ferrers, his age was about twenty-six, his fortune about eight hundred a year--he followed no profession. Lumley Ferrers had not what is usually called genius; that is, he had no enthusiasm; and if the word talent be properly interpreted as meaning the talent of doing something better than others, Ferrers had not much to boast of on that score. He had no talent for writing, nor for music, nor painting, nor the ordinary round of accomplishments; neither at present had he displayed much of the hard and useful talent for action and business. But Ferrers had what is often better than either genius or talent; he had a powerful and most acute mind. He had, moreover, great animation of manner, high physical spirits, a witty, odd, racy vein of conversation, determined assurance, and profound confidence in his own resources. He was fond of schemes, stratagems, and plots--they amused and excited him--his power of sarcasm, and of argument, too, was great, and he usually obtained an astonishing influence over those with whom he was brought in contact. His high spirits and a most happy frankness of bearing carried off and disguised his leading vices of character, which were callousness to whatever was affectionate and insensibility to whatever was moral. Though less learned than Maltravers, he was on the whole a very instructed man. He mastered the surfaces of many sciences, became satisfied of their general principles, and threw the study aside never to be forgotten (for his memory was like a vice), but never to be prosecuted any further. To this he added a general acquaintance with whatever is most generally acknowledged as standard in ancient or modern literature. What is admired only by a few, Lumley never took the trouble to read. Living amongst trifles, he made them interesting and novel by his mode of viewing and treating them. And here indeed was _a_ talent--it was the talent of social life--the talent of enjoyment to the utmost with the least degree of trouble to himself. Lumley Ferrers was thus exactly one of those men whom everybody calls exceedingly clever, and yet it would puzzle one to say in what he was so clever. It was, indeed, that nameless power which belongs to ability, and which makes one man superior, on the whole, to another, though in many details by no means remarkable.