20
WYLDER'S HJlJVD.
"You are a very fortunate person, Mr. Wylder; a
gentleman of very moderate abilities, with no prospects,
and without fortune, who finds himself, without any de-
servings of his own, on a sudden, possessed of an estate,
and about to be united to the most beautiful heiress in
England, is, I think, rather a fortunate person."
"You did not always think me so stupid, Miss Lake,'
said Mr. Wylder, showing something of the hectic of
vexation.
"Stupid! did I say? Well, you know, we learn by
experience, Mr. Wylder. One's judgment matures, and
we are harder to please—don't you think so?—as we
grow older."
"Aye, so we are, I dare say; at any rate, some things
don't please us as we calculated. I remember when this
bit of luck would have made me a devilish happy fellow
— twice as happy; but, you see, if a fellow hasn't his
liberty, where's the good of money? I don't know how I
got into it, but I can't get away now; and the lawyer
fellows, and trustees, and all that sort of prudent people,
get about one, and persuade, and exhort, and they bully
you, by Jove! into what they call a marriage of con-
venience — I forget the French word — you know; and
then, you see, your feelings may be very different, and all
that; and where's the good of money, I say, if you can't
enjoy it?"
And Mr. Wylder looked poetically unhappy, and trun
dlud over a little bit of fricandeau on his plate with his fork,
desolately, as though earthly things had lost their relish.
"Yes; I think I know the feeling," said Miss Lake,
quietly. "That ballad, you know, expresses it very
prettily :— " Oh, thou hast been the cause of this anguish,
my mother ?'"
Wylder looked sharply at her, but she did not smile,