He added,--

"The landlord should take care lest he become his own dupe, for it is
very likely that the pretty lodger would only take the room to sleep in,
and possibly only to sleep in now and then; and if she chose she would
have a perfect right to refuse to receive the proprietor's visits."

These sensible remarks delighted me, for after reading them I felt
forewarned.

Such matters as these give their chief interest to the English
newspapers. They are allowed to gossip about everything, and the writers
have the knack of making the merest trifles seem amusing. Happy is the
nation where anything may be written and anything said!

Lord Pembroke was the first to come and congratulate me on my idea, and
he was succeeded by Martinelli; but he expressed some fears as to the
possible consequences, "for," said he, "there are plenty of women in
London who would come and lodge with you to be your ruin."

"In that case," I answered, "it would be a case of Greek meeting Greek;
however, we shall see. If I am taken in, people will have the fullest
right to laugh at me, for I have been warned."

I will not trouble my readers with an account of the hundred women who
came in the first ten days, when I refused on one pretext or another,
though some of them were not wanting in grace and beauty. But one day,
when I was at dinner, I received a visit from a girl of from twenty to
twenty-four years, simply but elegantly dressed; her features were sweet
and gracious, though somewhat grave, her complexion pale, and her hair