“Amongst the many persons to whom I was presented I made two acquaintances of more than common interest to me,--I will not go farther, and say of any great degree of gratification. In dining with the Governor, yesterday week, he said, 'You will meet a relation to-day, Dr. Lendrick. His ship has just put in to coal, and he and his wife dine with us.' Though quite persuaded the Governor was laboring under some mistake, I waited with anxiety as the different arrivals were announced, and at last came Colonel and Mrs. Sewell,--the Colonel being Lady Lendrick's son by her first marriage,--what relation to myself all my skill in genealogy is unable to pronounce. “We met, however, shook hands very cordially, and I had the honor to conduct Mrs. Sewell to table. I am unfortunately terribly prone to first impressions, and all those that I entertain regarding the Colonel are adverse. He is a tall, handsome man, easy in manner, and with the readiness in speech and address that shows familiarity with life. He however will never suffer your eyes to meet his, never exchange a frank look with you, and seems, from some cause or other, to be always laboring under an impatient anxiety to be somewhere else than where he stands at the moment. “He asked about my father, and never waited for my reply; and he laughingly said, with a bad taste that shocked me, 'My mother and he never could hit it off together.' “Mrs. Sewell interested me more than her husband. She is still very handsome; she must at one time have been perfectly beautiful. She is very gentle, low-voiced, and quiet, talking with a simplicity that even I can detect only covers a deep knowledge of life and the world. The dread of her husband seems, however, to pervade all she says or does. She changes color when he looks at her, and if he addresses her, she sometimes seems about to faint. His slightest word is accepted as a command; and yet with all this terror--terror it was--I caught a look that once passed between them that actually overwhelmed me with amazement. It was the very look that two accomplices might have interchanged in a moment when they could not communicate more freely. Don't think that there is any exaggeration in this, Lucy, or that I am assuming to possess a finer insight into human motives than my neighbors; but my old craft as a doctor supplies me with a technical skill that no acquaintance with the mere surface-life of the world could have given; for the _Medico_ reads mankind by a stronger and steadier light than ever shone out of conventionalities or social usages.