The ingenious Mr. Tippetson, who had but an indistinct idea of the state of Clara's mind towards the image of Horatio Markham, thought that the young lady's affections had been misplaced and grievously disappointed: therefore, his talk to her was in the indirect and pathetic line of implied sympathy; and as Miss Henderson had aroused in Clara's heart all the romance of which it was capable, some little progress was thus made in her good-will. Ordinarily speaking and straightforwardly thinking, it seems a strange kind of process to take possession of a lady's heart by sympathising with her on the loss, or descanting on the virtues of a first love; but clumsy as this may seem in theory, it has succeeded in practice. Perhaps it is very good policy, when once the sensibilities have been kindled, to keep them alive; and as that love is surest which glides gradually into the heart, it may be as well not to let the mind cease to love, but to manage it and wind it so as to bring it gradually to a change of object. So when an unreasoning, strong-willed infant is playing with a toy, from which it may be desirable to detach its attention, it is not such good policy to wrest the said toy violently from its little hands, as gradually to insinuate another, and then the first toy quietly drops. In like manner, when the female heart mourns its first love frustrated, let him who seeks to succeed in the affection not wait till that affection is cold, and not seek to reason away its acuteness, but manage rather to keep it alive and gradually change its object. That dexterous and unerring instinct which, we have before said, belongs to such men as Mr. Tippetson, directed him to the plan which we have here recommended, and perhaps nothing was wanting but a sufficient portion of time to give it success. Happy it is, however, for the purposes of poetic justice, that this sufficient quantity of time was not allowed. Circumstances interfered to prevent such an abomination as the marriage of the silly, conceited, common-place, Henry Augustus Tippetson, to the mild, gentle, simple-hearted, kind-souled Clara Rivolta. If he had married her, he would soon have been weary of her pleasant, pretty, unaffected manners, and probably would have broken her heart by neglect. What these circumstances were must be detailed hereafter. CHAPTER XI. "Rich in these gifts, why should I wish for more?" P. WHITEHEAD.