And yet he was not an idiot; he was supposed to be very clever, and certainly is very quick and amusing. He was only reckless, and extraordinarily natural, as natural as if he had been an Irishman. In fact, of all the Englishmen that I have known he is the most Irish in temperament (though he has got over it comparatively of late). I used to tell him that it was a great inconvenience that he didn’t speak with a brogue, because then we should be forewarned, and know with whom we were dealing. He replied that, by analogy, if he were Irish enough to have a brogue he would probably be English, which seemed to me an answer wonderfully in character. Like most young Britons of his class he went to America, to see the great country, before he was twenty, and he took a letter to my father, who had occasion, _à propos_ of some pickle of course, to render him a considerable service. This led to his coming to see me--I had already been living here three or four years--on his return; and that, in the course of time, led to our becoming fast friends, without, as I tell you, the smallest philandering on either side. But I must n’t protest too much; I shall excite your suspicion. “If he has made love to so many women, why should n’t he have made love to you?”--some inquiry of that sort you will be likely to make. I have answered it already, “Simply on account of those very engagements.” He could n’t make love to every one, and with me it would n’t have done him the least good. It was a more amiable weakness than his brother’s, and he has always behaved very well. How well he behaved on a very important occasion is precisely the subject of my story. He was supposed to have embraced the diplomatic career; had been secretary of legation at some German capital; but after his brother’s death he came home and looked out for a seat in Parliament. He found it with no great trouble and has kept it ever since. No one would have the heart to turn him out, he is so good-looking. It’s a great thing to be represented by one of the handsomest men in England, it creates such a favorable association of ideas. Any one would be amazed to discover that the borough he sits for, and the name of which I am always forgetting, is not a very pretty place. I have never seen it, and have no idea that it is n’t, and I am sure he will survive every revolution. The people must feel that if they should n’t keep him some monster would be returned. You remember his appearance,--how tall, and fair, and strong he is, and always laughing, yet without looking silly. He is exactly the young man girls in America figure to themselves--in the place of the hero--when they read English novels, and wish to imagine something very aristocratic and Saxon. A “bright Bostonian” who met him once at my house, exclaimed as soon as he had gone out of the room, “At last, at last, I behold it, the mustache of Roland Tremayne!” “Of Roland Tremayne!”