When the heart is bruised, and the understanding perplexed, it is astonishing to think how the strongest minds turn to lean on some one being whom they deem willing to soothe and share in their feelings; and if it is a weakness, it is one so linked to all the best parts of our nature, that there would be no advantage gained by exchanging it for that cold hardness of self-sufficiency, to which some persons lay claim as affording them a superiority over their fellow-creatures. Such was certainly not Lord Albert's case. Whatever he might or might not confess to himself, it was with a worn-out spirit that he sought Lady Hamlet Vernon; and on hearing that she was at home, he threw himself off his horse, and hastened into her presence. Although she was too well skilled in reading the human heart, not to be aware that she owed this visit rather to his displeasure in other quarters, than from a spontaneous wish to enjoy her society, yet she received him, as she always did, with those gentle smiles which captivate the heart, and which is the temper ever sought for and expected in woman. Lady Hamlet Vernon knew that the general selfishness of man seeks only the reflection of his own sensations from the sympathy of women; and that whatever cause a woman may have of pain or pleasure, it is _his_ feelings, and not her own, which she must consult, soothe, and influence; and that, in short, when she ceases to be his sunshine, he ceases to court her influence. It was acting under this conviction, which made Lady Hamlet Vernon, with infallible delicacy and truth of tact, neither seem to search into secrets which Lord Albert did not choose to reveal, nor yet appear carelessly ignorant of the melancholy restlessness by which she saw him affected; but alternately she soothed, flattered, and sympathized in all he said, till at last she succeeded, for the time being, in reconciling him with himself, and in a great measure allaying the irritation of those various feelings which almost distracted him when he first entered her apartment. Before he took his leave, it was finally arranged between them, that he should accompany her to the _fête_ the next day, if he could leave Downing-street in time; and if he could not, he would, he said, meet her at Avington Park, and go there with Lord Glenmore, who, in the event of his being detained, would be detained also.