As opposite as were the characters, so was the conduct of Caroline’s two noble suitors.  St. Eval, spite of the encouragement he received, yet shrunk from paying any marked attention either to Caroline or her parents.  It was by degrees he became intimate in their family, but there, perhaps, the only person with whom he felt entirely at ease was Emmeline, who, rejoicing at Caroline’s change of manner, began to hope her feelings were changing too, and indulged in hopes that one day Lord St. Eval might really be her brother.  Emmeline knew her sister’s opinion of coquetry was very different to hers; but this simple-minded girl could never have conceived that scheme of duplicity, which, by the aid and counsel of Annie, Caroline now practised.  She scarcely ever saw Alphingham, and never hearing her sister name him, and being perfectly unconscious of his attentions when they met, she could not, even in her unusually acute imagination, believe him St. Eval’s rival.  More and more enamoured the young Earl became each time he felt himself an especial object of Caroline’s notice; his heart throbbed and his hopes grew stronger, still he breathed not one word of love, he dared not.  Diffident of his own attractive qualities, he feared to speak, till he thought he could be assured of her affections.  In the intoxication of love, he felt her refusal would have more effect upon him than he could bear.  He shrunk from the remarks of the world, and waited yet a little longer, ere with a trembling heart he should ask that all-important question.  So matters stood in Mr. Hamilton’s family during the greater part of the London season; but as it is not our task to enter into Caroline’s gaieties, we here may be permitted to mention Mrs. Greville’s departure with her delicate and suffering child from the land of their birth.

Mr. Greville had made no opposition to their intended plan.  Seriously Mr. Maitland had told him that the life of his child depended on her residence for some time abroad, in a genial climate and extreme quiet; but in vain did Mrs. Greville endeavour to believe that affection for his daughter and herself occasioned this unwonted acquiescence; it was too clearly to be perceived that he was pleased at their separation from himself, for it gave him more liberty.  She wrote to her son, imploring him in the most earnest and affectionate manner to return home for the Easter vacation, that she might see him for a few days before she left England—­perhaps never to return.  Ruined from earliest boyhood by weak indulgence, Alfred Greville felt sometimes a throb of natural feeling for his mother, though her counsels were of no avail.  Touched by the mournful solemnity and deep affection breathing in every line, he complied with her request, and spent four or five days peacefully at home.  He appeared shocked at the alteration he found in his sister, and was kinder than he had previously been in his manner towards her.  He had lately become heir to a fortune and estate, left him by a very old