seeing you arrive at; and till that moment I must continue filing and polishing.  In a letter that I received by last post, from a friend of yours at Paris, there was this paragraph:  “I have the honor to assure you, without flattery, that Mr. Stanhope succeeds beyond what might be expected from a person of his age.  He goes into very good company; and that kind of manner, which was at first thought to be too decisive and peremptory, is now judged otherwise; because it is acknowledged to be the effect of an ingenuous frankness, accompanied by politeness, and by a proper deference.  He studies to please, and succeeds.  Madame du Puisieux was the other day speaking of him with complacency and friendship.  You will be satisfied with him in all respects.”  This is extremely well, and I rejoice at it:  one little circumstance only may, and I hope will, be altered for the better.  Take pains to undeceive those who thought that ’petit ton un peu delcide et un peu brusque’; as it is not meant so, let it not appear so.  Compose your countenance to an air of gentleness and ‘douceur’, use some expressions of diffidence of your own opinion, and deference to other people’s; such as, “If I might be permitted to say—­I should think—­Is it not rather so?  At least I have the greatest reason to be diffident of myself.”  Such mitigating, engaging words do by no means weaken your argument; but, on the contrary, make it more powerful by making it more pleasing.  If it is a quick and hasty manner of speaking that people mistake ’pour decide et brusque’, prevent their mistakes for the future by speaking more deliberately, and taking a softer tone of voice; as in this case you are free from the guilt, be free from the suspicion, too.  Mankind, as I have often told you, are more governed by appearances than by realities; and with regard to opinion, one had better be really rough and hard, with the appearance of gentleness and softness, than just the reverse.  Few people have penetration enough to discover, attention enough to observe, or even concern enough to examine beyond the exterior; they take their notions from the surface, and go no deeper:  they commend, as the gentlest and best-natured man in the world, that man who has the most engaging exterior manner, though possibly they have been but once in his company.  An air, a tone of voice, a composure of countenance to mildness and softness, which are all easily acquired, do the business:  and without further examination, and possibly with the contrary qualities, that man is reckoned the gentlest, the modestest, and the best-natured man alive.  Happy the man, who, with a certain fund of parts and knowledge, gets acquainted with the world early enough to make it his bubble, at an age when most people are the bubbles of the world! for that is the common case of youth.  They grow wiser when it is too late; and, ashamed and vexed at having been bubbles so long, too often turn knaves at last.  Do not therefore trust to appearances and outside yourself,