“I am merely discharging a servant at a moment’s warning, Miss Fane; and if you wish to engage his constant attendance upon yourself, I have no objection to give him a character for the occasion.” “What do you want, Essper?” said Miss Fane. “Merely to see whether your walk this morning had done your appetites any good,” answered Essper, looking disconsolate; “and so I thought I might make myself useful at the same time. And though I do not bring on the soup in a cocked hat, and carve the venison with a couteau-de-chasse,” continued he, bowing very low to Ernstorff, who, standing stiff behind his master’s chair, seemed utterly unaware that any other person in the room could experience a necessity; “still I can change a plate or hand the wine without cracking the first, or drinking the second.” “And very good qualities, too!” said Miss Fane. “Come, Essper, you shall put your accomplishments into practice immediately; change my plate.” This Essper did with dexterity and quiet, displaying at the same time a small white hand, on the back of which was marked a comet and three daggers. As he had the discretion not to open his mouth, and performed all his duties with skill, his intrusion in a few minutes was not only pardoned but forgotten. “There has been a great addition to the visitors to-day, I see,” said Mr. St. George. “Who are the new comers?” “I will tell you all about them,” said the Baron. “This family is one of those whose existence astounds the Continent much more than any of your mighty dukes and earls, whose fortunes, though colossal, can be conceived, and whose rank is understood. Mr. Fitzloom is a very different personage, for thirty years ago he was a journeyman cotton spinner. Some miraculous invention in machinery entitled him to a patent, which has made him one of the great proprietors of England. He has lately been returned a member for a manufacturing town, and he intends to get over the first two years of his parliamentary career by successively monopolising the accommodation of all the principal cities of France, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy, and by raising the price of provisions and post-horses through a track of five thousand miles. My information is authentic, for I had a casual acquaintance with him in England. There was some talk of a contract for supplying our army from England, and I saw Fitzloom often on the subject. I have spoken to him to-day. This is by no means the first of the species that we have had in Germany. I can assure you that the plain traveller feels seriously the inconvenience of following such a caravan; their money flows with such unwise prodigality that real liberality ceases to be valued; and many of your nobility have complained to me that in their travels they are now often expostulated with on account of their parsimony, and taunted with the mistaken extravagance of a stocking-maker or a porter-brewer.” “What pleasure can such people find in travelling?” wondered Mr. St. George.