Another, mine honest Harry, would take the trouble to recall to your mind past times and circumstances, and conclude with expressing a humble opinion, that if Harry Jekyl were asked _now_ to do any service for the noble lord aforesaid, Harry had got his reward in his pocket aforehand.

But I do not argue thus, because I would rather be leagued with a friend who assists me with a view to future profit, than from respect to benefits already received.

The first lies like the fox's scent when on his last legs, increasing every moment; the other is a back-scent, growing colder the longer you follow it, until at last it becomes impossible to puzzle it out.

I will, therefore, submit to circumstances, and tell you the whole story, though somewhat tedious, in hopes that I can conclude with such a trail as you will open upon breast-high.
"Thus then it was .-- Francis, fifth Earl of Etherington, and my much-honoured father, was what is called a very eccentric man--that is, he was neither a wise man nor a fool--had too much sense to walk into a well, and yet in some of the furious fits which he was visited with, I have seen him quite mad enough to throw any one else into it .-- Men said there was a lurking insanity--but it is an ill bird, &c., and I will say no more about it.

This shatterbrained peer was, in other respects, a handsome accomplished man, with an expression somewhat haughty, yet singularly pleasing when he chose it--a man, in short, who might push his fortune with the fair sex.
"Lord Etherington, such as I have described him, being upon his travels in France, formed an attachment of the heart--ay, and some have pretended, of the hand also, with a certain beautiful orphan, Marie de Martigny.