indulgence of which is an offence against the habits of the world. Her
tastes were, however, too feminine and chaste ever to render her
eccentric: they were rather calculated to conceal than to publish the
deeper recesses of her nature; and it was beneath that polished surface
of manner common to those with whom she mixed, that she hid the treasures
of a mine which no human eye had beheld.

Her health, naturally delicate, had lately suffered much from the
dissipation of London, and it was by the advice of physicians that she
had now come to spend the summer at E------. Lady Margaret Leslie, who
was old enough to be tired with the caprices of society, and Mrs. Dalton,
who, having just lost her husband, was forbidden at present to partake of
its amusements, had agreed to accompany her to her retreat. Neither of
them was perhaps much suited to Emily's temper, but youth and spirits
make almost any one congenial to us: it is from the years which confirm
our habits, and the reflections which refine our taste, that it becomes
easy to revolt us, and difficult to please.

On the third day after Emily's arrival at E------, she was sitting after
breakfast with Lady Margaret and Mrs. Dalton. "Pray," said the former,
"did you ever meet my relation, Mr. Falkland? he is in your immediate
neighbourhood." "Never; though I have a great curiosity: that fine old
ruin beyond the village belongs to him, I believe." "It does. You ought
to know him: you would like him so!" "Like him!" repeated Mrs. Dalton,
who was one of those persons of ton who, though everything collectively,
are nothing individually: "like him? impossible!" "Why?" said Lady
Margaret, indignantly--"he has every requisite to please--youth, talent,
fascination of manner, and great knowledge of the world." "Well," said
Mrs. Dalton, "I cannot say I discovered his perfections. He seemed to me
conceited and satirical, and--and--in short, very disagreeable; but then,