LETTER XIX.

MISS HOWARD TO A. HOWARD, Esq.

(_Inclosed in the preceding._)

My dear Arthur,

Your letter has made me gloomy, and my mother's temper does not improve my spirits: she is very angry with you, and so offended by the style of your remarks on Adelaide's approaching marriage, that so far from wishing your presence, I am commissioned to say, it is my mother's express desire that you should not come to town till the ceremony is over. As you are not yet _quite_ of age, you could not be of any absolute use at present; and she will contrive, upon the good faith of your assistance when you are enabled to give your aid, to supply the immediate necessity for money by borrowing on bond. This is her message; but as her anxiety that you should quit your present situation is fully equal to her wish that you should not come here, she would be glad if you were to _go_ to the Continent; and as your friend Falkland is somewhere in Italy, and his company may be an inducement to _immediate_ arrangements, she has no objection to your joining him and his tutor wherever they may be. It is my mother's design to hasten the marriage as quickly as possible. She means to inform Crayton that you have seriously hurt your leg, which will be sufficient excuse for your non-appearance; and should he ever discover that you have left Glenalta to go abroad while it might be supposed that you could not stir from your sofa, it will be easy to make out a new _version_; or if the wedding is _over_, as soon as we hope that it _will_ be, we shall not care much about a slight inconsistency which will not signify a _rush_ when the deed is done.

You look grave, but really it cannot be helped. Nothing could be worse than any interruption to the nuptials of Clayton and Adelaide; it must not be; and though I _believe_ him to be a gambler, and _know_ him to be a dunce, our sister is willing to wear his coronet, and excuse his errors and deficiencies. For myself, I am not sorry that the bustle of coachmakers, jewellers, milliners, &c. in which we are involved, prevents my having time to _think_ much, for I am low, and quite out of humour. What you say of the world is true enough, and no one feels _how_ true except he is carried round like a fly upon its wheel; but to stand still is worse: it makes one's head giddy to pause; and the country after all is so flat, so utterly devoid of interest, that tiresome as I _confess_ a London life to be, any thing is better than the cobwebs of retirement. A rural bower sets one to sleep, even in imagination, and the only part of the system kept _alive_ in retreat is the muscular apparatus by which we yawn.

If I could find out any "Royal road" to happiness, I should like to cut many of my acquaintances; but till I do, they must be endured, idle and silly as they are.

Here comes a man with Ady's diamonds, and I am called to council. I will write a line to Paris, _poste restante_; so as you will probably make at once for the French capital, as a central point; you will there receive intelligence of _our advancement_ to _the peerage_. I will send you the newspapers that you may see how the paragraph _runs_. Old Lord Hawkston, being our hundred and fiftieth cousin, _La Madre_ applies to him to act your part in giving the bride away.

Called again. Coming! coming!

Yours, ever affectionately, L. HOWARD.