the election of a Protector, and to give our yea or nay for his shuffling
Grace of----? or for that noisy Ryland? Do you believe, Verney, that I
brought you to town for that? No, we will have a Protector of our own. We
will set up a candidate, and ensure his success. We will nominate Adrian,
and do our best to bestow on him the power to which he is entitled by his
birth, and which he merits through his virtues.

"Do not answer; I know all your objections, and will reply to them in
order. First, Whether he will or will not consent to become a great man?
Leave the task of persuasion on that point to me; I do not ask you to
assist me there. Secondly, Whether he ought to exchange his employment of
plucking blackberries, and nursing wounded partridges in the forest, for
the command of a nation? My dear Lionel, we are married men, and find
employment sufficient in amusing our wives, and dancing our children. But
Adrian is alone, wifeless, childless, unoccupied. I have long observed him.
He pines for want of some interest in life. His heart, exhausted by his
early sufferings, reposes like a new-healed limb, and shrinks from all
excitement. But his understanding, his charity, his virtues, want a field
for exercise and display; and we will procure it for him. Besides, is it
not a shame, that the genius of Adrian should fade from the earth like a
flower in an untrod mountain-path, fruitless? Do you think Nature composed
his surpassing machine for no purpose? Believe me, he was destined to be
the author of infinite good to his native England. Has she not bestowed on
him every gift in prodigality?--birth, wealth, talent, goodness? Does not
every one love and admire him? and does he not delight singly in such
efforts as manifest his love to all? Come, I see that you are already
persuaded, and will second me when I propose him to-night in parliament."

"You have got up all your arguments in excellent order," I replied; "and,
if Adrian consent, they are unanswerable. One only condition I would make,