in her own room, paying off, as she said, the dull arrears of
correspondence, rather on Lord Saxingham's account than her own; for he
punctiliously exacted from her the most scrupulous attention to cousins
fifty times removed, provided they were rich, clever, well off, or in
any way of consequence:--it was one afternoon that, relieved from these
avocations, Lady Florence strolled through the grounds with Cleveland.
The gentlemen were still in the stubble-fields, the ladies were out in
barouches and pony phaetons, and Cleveland and Lady Florence were alone.

Apropos of Florence's epistolary employment, their conversation fell
upon that most charming species of literature, which joins with the
interest of a novel the truth of a history--the French memoir and
letter-writers. It was a part of literature in which Cleveland was
thoroughly at home.

"Those agreeable and polished gossips," said he, "how well they
contrived to introduce nature into art! Everything artificial seemed so
natural to them. They even feel by a kind of clockwork, which seems to
go better than the heart itself. Those pretty sentiments, those
delicate gallantries, of Madame de Sevigne to her daughter, how amiable
they are; but, somehow or other, I can never fancy them the least
motherly. What an ending for a maternal epistle is that elegant
compliment--'Songez que de tons les coeurs ou vous regnez, il n'y en a
aucun ou votre empire soit si bien etabli que dans le mien.'* I can
scarcely fancy Lord Saxingham writing so to you, Lady Florence."

* Think that of all the hearts over which you reign, there is not one in
which your empire can be so well established as in mine.

"No, indeed," replied Lady Florence, smiling. "Neither papas nor mammas