‘And some of you women, I think, too,’ said Mr. Pole.

Lady Monteagle faintly smiled.

‘Poor Cadurcis!’ she exclaimed; ’he has a very hard life of it.  He complains bitterly that so many women are in love with him.  But then he is such an interesting creature, what can he expect?’

‘Interesting!’ exclaimed Mr. Pole.  ’Now I hold he is the most conceited, affected fellow that I ever met,’ he continued with unusual energy.

‘Ah! you men do not understand him,’ said Lady Monteagle, shaking her head.  ‘You cannot,’ she added, with a look of pity.

‘I cannot, certainly,’ said Mr. Pole, ’or his writings either.  For my part I think the town has gone mad.’

‘Well, you must confess,’ said her ladyship, with a glance of triumph, ‘that it was very lucky for us that I made him a Whig.’

‘I cannot agree with you at all on that head,’ said Mr. Pole.  ’We certainly are not very popular at this moment, and I feel convinced that a connection with a person who attracts so much notice as Cadurcis unfortunately does, and whose opinions on morals and religion must be so offensive to the vast majority of the English public, must ultimately prove anything but advantageous to our party.’

‘Oh! my dear Mr. Pole,’ said her ladyship, in a tone of affected deprecation, ‘think what a genius he is!’

‘We have very different ideas of genius, Lady Monteagle, I suspect,’ said her visitor.

‘You cannot deny,’ replied her ladyship, rising from her recumbent posture, with some animation, ‘that he is a poet?’

‘It is difficult to decide upon our contemporaries,’ said Mr. Pole dryly.

‘Charles Fox thinks he is the greatest poet that ever existed,’ said her ladyship, as if she were determined to settle the question.

‘Because he has written a lampoon on the royal family,’ rejoined Mr. Pole.

‘You are a very provoking person,’ said Lady Monteagle; ’but you do not provoke me; do not flatter yourself you do.’

’That I feel to be an achievement alike beyond my power and my ambition,’ replied Mr. Pole, slightly bowing, but with a sneer.

‘Well, read this,’ said Lady Monteagle, ’and then decide upon the merits of Cadurcis.’

Mr. Pole took the extended volume, but with no great willingness, and turned over a page or two and read a passage here and there.

‘Much the same as his last effusion, I think’ he observed, as far as I can judge from so cursory a review.  Exaggerated passion, bombastic language, egotism to excess, and, which perhaps is the only portion that is genuine, mixed with common-place scepticism and impossible morals, and a sort of vague, dreamy philosophy, which, if it mean anything, means atheism, borrowed from his idol, Herbert, and which he himself evidently does not comprehend.’

‘Monster!’ exclaimed Lady Monteagle, with a mock assumption of indignation, ’and you are going to dine with him here to-day.  You do not deserve it.’