NOTE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.

The Publishers would state that the following work has been reprinted in answer to the frequent inquiries which have been made for it. Its author was previously consulted, however, and his approval of its republication gained.

They would also state, that desiring to show their sense of the excellence of the book, they have made an arrangement with its writer, similar to that which they would make with an American author.

BOSTON, May 1849.

CHAPTER I.

NONE but those who, like myself, have once lived in intellectual society, and have then been deprived of it for years, can appreciate the delight of finding it again. Not that I have any right to complain, if I were fated to live as a recluse forever. I can add little, or nothing, to the pleasure of any company; I like to listen rather than to talk; and when any thing apposite does occur to me, it is generally the day after the conversation has taken place. I do not, however, love good talk the less for these defects of mine; and I console myself with thinking that I sustain the part of a judicious listener, not always an easy one.

Great then was my delight at hearing last year that my old pupil, Milverton, had taken a house which had long been vacant in our neighbourhood. To add to my pleasure, his