This event, however alarming at the moment, had no serious consequence; for Lady Julia caught neither fever nor cold, though Miss Strictland was morally certain her ladyship would have one or the other; indeed she insinuated, that her ladyship deserved to have both. Lady Sarah’s poor shivering knight of the shire, however, did not escape so well. Obliged to row home, in a damp evening, without his great-coat, which he had been forced to offer to Lady Julia, in a pleasure-boat, when he should have been in flannels or in bed, he had “cause to rue the boating of that day.” His usual panacea of the gout did not come as expected, _to set him up again_. The cold he caught this day killed him. Lady Sarah Lidhurst was precisely as sorry as decorum required. But the bustle of a new election was soon to obliterate the memory of the old member, in the minds of his numerous friends. Lord Glistonbury, and several other voices in the county, called upon Vivian to stand on the independent interest. There was to be a contest: for a government candidate declared himself at the same moment that application was made to Vivian. The expense of a contested election alarmed both Vivian and his mother. Gratified as she was by the honour of this offer, yet she had the prudence to advise her son rather to go into parliament as representative for a borough than to hazard the expense of a contest for the county. Miss Sidney, also, whom he consulted upon this occasion, supported his mother’s prudent advice, in the most earnest manner; and Vivian was inclined to follow this counsel, till Lord Glistonbury came one morning to plead the contrary side of the question: he assured Vivian, that from his experience of the county, he was morally certain they should carry it without trouble, and with no expense _worth mentioning_. These were only general phrases, to be sure, not arguments; but these, joined to her ambition to see her son member for the county, at length overpowered Lady Mary’s better judgment: her urgent entreaties were now joined to those of Lord Glistonbury, and of many loud-tongued electioneerers, who proved to Vivian, by every thing but calculation, that he must be returned if he would but stand--if he would only declare himself. Russell and his own prudence strongly counselled him to resist these clamorous importunities; the two preceding candidates, whose fortunes had been nearly as good as his, had been ruined by the contests. Vivian was very young, but just of age; and Russell observed, “that it would be better for him to see something more of the world, before he should embark in politics, and plunge into public business.” “True,” said Vivian; “but Mr. Pitt was only three-and-twenty when he was minister of England. I am not ambitious; but I should certainly like to distinguish myself, if I could; and whilst I feel in youth the glow of patriotism, why should I not serve my country?”