“Nonsense!” said the young lady: “but as the papers said that Captain Montgomery was the favoured lover, why should he shoot himself?” “Cannot say, really. The quadrilles are forming; we had better take our place.” “Lady Julia L. is vastly lovely! Is she not?” he proceeded, after they had secured their ground. The lady was wondering how Captain Montgomery, or any body else, could have been preferred to Lord Fitz-Ullin, he was so handsome; and only answered, “Yes, very pretty indeed: and what a beautiful dress she has on!” Several sets of quadrilles were now arranged, and were on the point of commencing. “What a very handsome young man Lord Fitz-Ullin is!” said another young lady, to an ugly, stiff, old partner; who had once, of course, been young, and, by accident, the fashion; but who, by thinking himself a prize too long, had lost both those advantages. “Possibly,” he replied; “but I was looking at the lady. Lady Julia L. is really almost beautiful enough to tempt a man to sacrifice his liberty!” “Can that be Lord Fitz-Ullin?” said Lady D. to a certain gay Colonel, who, emerging from the part of the crowd which had lately entered the room, approached her ladyship. The Colonel was, or thought himself, handsome; and we hope, for his own sake, he was not mistaken; as, excepting his personal attractions, he had nothing but his half-pay; not even professional prospects, having taken the difference from whole to half-pay for the discharge of debts. His aspirations were now, therefore, limited to that last resource of the desperate—matrimony! Lady D. was a showy, rich, and not very old widow; a dasher, and a professed admirer of handsome men: on which last trait in her ladyship’s character the Colonel founded very brilliant hopes. “I have seen Lord Ormond in his father’s life-time,” pursued Lady D.; “but I had no recollection of his being half so handsome! Is that really Lord Fitz-Ullin?” “If your ladyship means the gentleman who is standing at the head of the first quadrille with Lady Julia L.,” replied the Colonel, “he is, undoubtedly, Lord Fitz-Ullin.” “He is a thousand times handsomer,” said the lady, looking again, “a thousand times handsomer than I thought Lord Ormond at the time, though now I do remember thinking him a pleasing looking young man. What a difference three or four years have made (it was six or seven, but the lady did not choose to say so); he has now so much more character of countenance, and so fine a figure!” The Colonel, not a little mortified, answered, “The fellow looks as if he were going to be hanged! and that, with such an angel for a partner, is quite unpardonable.” “As the lady’s whole attention seems occupied by the chalking of the floor,” said Lady D., “it is no wonder she cannot animate her partner.”