"Perhaps it may soon receive that addition. I am yet undecided whether I
shall sell it."

"Sell it! sell Burleigh!--the last memorial of your mother's ancestry!
the classic retreat of the graceful Digbys! Sell Burleigh!"

"I had almost resolved to do so when I came hither; then I forswore the
intention: now again I sometimes sorrowfully return to the idea."

"And in Heaven's name, why?"

"My old restlessness returns. Busy myself as I will here, I find the
range of action monotonous and confined. I began too soon to draw around
me the large circumference of literature and action; and the small
provincial sphere seems to me a sad going back in life. Perhaps I should
not feel this, were my home less lonely; but as it is--no, the wanderer's
ban is on me, and I again turn towards the lands of excitement and
adventure."

"I understand this, Ernest; but why is your home so solitary? You are
still at the age in which wise and congenial unions are the most
frequently formed; your temper is domestic; your easy fortune and sobered
ambition allow you to choose without reference to worldly considerations.
Look round the world, and mix with the world again, and give Burleigh the
mistress it requires."

Maltravers shook his head, and sighed.

"I do not say," continued Cleveland, wrapped in the glowing interest of
the theme, "that you should marry a mere girl, but an amiable woman, who,