“You don’t remember,” said Clarence (as we will yet continue to call our hero), smiling, “that your husband had forgotten it.” “Ay, sir,” cried the piqued steward, “but that was because you wore your hat slouched over your eyes: if you had taken off that, I should have known you directly.” “However that may be,” said Clarence, unwilling to dwell longer on an occurrence which he saw hurt the feelings of the kind Mr. Wardour, “it is very easy to explain how I preserved my incognito. You recollect that my father never suffered me to mix with my mother’s guests: so that I had no chance of their remembering me, especially as during the last three years and a half no stranger had ever entered our walls. Add to this that I was in the very time of life in which a few years work the greatest change, and on going to London I was thrown entirely among people who could never have seen me before. Fortunately for me, I became acquainted with my mother’s uncle; circumstances subsequently led me to disclose my birth to him, upon a promise that he would never call me by any other name than that which I had assumed. He, who was the best, the kindest, the most generous of human beings, took a liking to me. He insisted not only upon his relationship to me, as my grand-uncle, but upon the justice of repairing to me the wrongs his unhappy niece had caused me. The delicacy of his kindness, the ties of blood, and an accident which had enabled me to be of some service to him, all prevented my resisting the weight of obligation with which he afterwards oppressed me. He procured me an appointment abroad: I remained there four years. When I returned, I entered, it is true, into very general society: but four years had, as you may perceive, altered me greatly; and even had there previously existed any chance of my being recognized, that alteration would probably have been sufficient to insure my secret.” “But your brother,--my present lord,--did you never meet him, sir?” “Often, my good mother; but you remember that I was little more than six years old when he left England, and when he next saw me I was about two and twenty: it would have been next to a miracle, or, at least, would have required the eyes of love like yours, to have recalled me to memory after such an absence.” “Well--to turn to my story--I succeeded, partly as his nearest relation, but principally from an affection dearer than blood, to the fortune of my grand-uncle, Mr. Talbot. Fate prospered with me: I rose in the world’s esteem and honour, and soon became prouder of my borrowed appellation than of all the titles of my lordly line. Circumstances occurring within the last week which it will be needless to relate, but which may have the greatest influence over my future life, made it necessary to do what I had once resolved I would never do,--prove my identity and origin. Accordingly I came here to seek you.”