That sorrowful expression, too, was the more unaccountable, inasmuch as the social position of Georgiana Hatfield seemed to be enviable in the extreme. Beautiful in person, possessing rank and wealth, and free to follow her own inclinations, she might have shone the star of fashion—the centre of that human galaxy whose sphere is the West End of London. Oh! bright—gloriously bright are the planets which move in that heaven of their own:—and yet how useless is their brilliancy! The planets of God's own sky are made to bestow their light upon the orbs which without them would revolve in darkness; but the planets of the sphere of aristocracy and fashion throw not a single ray upon the millions of inferior stars which are compelled to circle around them! To Lady Hatfield the pleasures and dissipation of the West End were unwelcome; and she seldom entered into society, save when a refusal would prove an offence. Up to the age of seventeen or eighteen she had been remarkable for a happy, joyous, and gay disposition: but a sudden change came over her at that period of her life; and since then her habits had grown retired—her disposition mournful. But let us return to her, as she lay reclining on the sofa in the drawing-room. The robbery of the preceding night and the events of the morning had evidently produced a powerful impression upon her mind. At times an expression of acute anguish distorted her fair countenance for a moment; and once or twice she compressed her lips forcibly, as if to restrain a burst of mental agony. The time-piece upon the mantel had just proclaimed the hour of eight, when a domestic entered the room and announced the Earl of Ellingham. Georgiana started up—assumed a placid expression of countenance—and advanced to receive the young nobleman, who, as he took her hand, respectfully pressed it to his lips. "Your ladyship will, I hope, pardon me for intruding at this hour," he said, as he conducted her back to the sofa, and then took a chair at a short distance; "but I was not aware of your return to town until an hour ago, when I perused in the evening paper an account of the outrage of last night and the investigation at Bow Street this morning. How annoying it must have been to you, my dear Lady Hatfield, to have gone through the ordeal of a visit to a police-court!" "There is something gloomy and dispiriting in the aspect of these tribunals which the crimes of the human race have rendered necessary," observed Georgiana. "The countenances of those persons whom I beheld at the police-office this morning, had all a certain sinister expression which I cannot define, but which seemed to proclaim that they never contemplated aught save the dark side of society."