Mr.Merton was upon very friendly terms with his brother, looked after the property in the absence of Sir John, kept up the family interest, was an excellent electioneerer, a good speaker at a pinch, an able magistrate,--a man, in short, most useful in the county; on the whole, he was more popular than his brother, and almost as much looked up to--perhaps, because he was much less ostentatious.

He had very good taste, had the Rev.Charles Merton!--his table plentiful, but plain--his manners affable to the low, though agreeably sycophantic to the high; and there was nothing about him that ever wounded self-love.

To add to the attractions of his house, his wife, simple and good-tempered, could talk with anybody, take off the bores, and leave people to be comfortable in their own way: while he had a large family of fine children of all ages, that had long given easy and constant excuse under the name of "little children's parties," for getting up an impromptu dance or a gypsy dinner,--enlivening the neighbourhood, in short.

Caroline was the eldest; then came a son, attached to a foreign ministry, and another, who, though only nineteen, was a private secretary to one of our Indian satraps.

The acquaintance of these young gentlemen, thus engaged, it was therefore Evelyn's misfortune to lose the advantage of cultivating,--a loss which both Mr.
and Mrs.Merton assured her was very much to be regretted.