“I can forgive your astonishment,” replied she, with a look of anger, “that the qualities you hold so highly in your esteem should have met favor from one so placed and gifted as the Earl of Netherby.” “Nay, madam; on the contrary. My difficulty is to think how any new proffer of attachment could find reception in a heart I fondly thought closed against such appeals; too full of its own memories of the past to profane the recollection by--” I hesitated and stopped. Another moment, and I would have uttered a word which for worlds I would not have spoken. My mother became suddenly pale as marble, and lay back in her chair as if faint and sick. His Lordship adjusted his neckcloth and his watch-chain, and walked towards the window, with an air of as much awkwardness as so very courtly a personage could exhibit. “You see, my Lord,” said my mother,--and her voice trembled at every word,--“you see, I was right: I told you how much this interview would agitate and distress me.” “But it need not, madam,” interposed I; “or, at all events, it may be rendered very brief. I sought an opportunity of speaking to you, in the hope that whatever impressions you may have received of my conduct in Ireland were either exaggerated or unjust; that I might convince you, however I may have erred in prudence or judgment, I have transgressed neither in honor nor good faith.” “Vindications,” said my mother, “are very weak things in the face of direct facts. Did you, or did you not, resign your appointment on the viceroy's staff--I stop not to ask with what scant courtesy--that you might be free to rove over the country, on some knight-errant absurdity? Did you, after having one disreputable quarrel in the same neighborhood, again involve yourself and your name in an affair with a notorious mob-orator and disturber, and thus become the 'celebrity' of the newspapers for at least a fortnight? And lastly, when I hoped, by absence from England, and foreign service, to erase the memory of these follies--to give them no harsher name,--did you not refuse the appointment, and without advice or permission sell out of the army altogether?” “Without adverting to the motives, madam, you have so kindly attributed to me, I beg to say 'yes' to all your questions. I am no longer an officer in his Majesty's service.” “Nor any longer a member of _my_ family, sir,” said my mother, passionately; “at least so far as the will rests with me. A gentleman so very independent in his principles is doubtless not less so in his circumstances. You are entitled to five thousand pounds only, by your father's will: this, if I mistake not, you have received and spent many a day ago. I will not advert to what my original intentions in your behalf were; they are recorded, however, in this paper, which you, my Lord, have read.” Here her Ladyship drew forth a document, like a law-paper, while the Earl bowed a deep acquiescence, and muttered something like--“Very generous and noble-minded, indeed!”