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in that part of the county, and who would appear to possess a cultivated taste for the Fine Arts, was likewise deterred, by some such cause, from examining the family pictures with that leisure, that attention, that care, which he might have desired to bestow upon them, and which some of them might possibly have repaid.” Here he produced a card, and read, with much gravity and a little trouble, through his eye-glass, “Mr. Hirrold,—Herald—Harold—Skampling—Skumpling—I beg your pardon,—Skimpole.”

“This is Mr. Harold Skimpole,” said my guardian, evidently surprised.

“Oli!” exclaimed Sir Leicester, “I am happy to meet Mr. Skimpole, and to have the opportunity of tendering my personal regrets. I hope, sir, that when you again find yourself in my part of the county, you will be under no similar sense of restraint.”

“You are very obliging, Sir Leicester Dedlock. So encouraged, I shall certainly give myself the pleasure and advantage of another visit to your beautiful house. The owners of such places as Chesney Wold,” said Mr. Skimpole with his usual happy and easy air, “are public benefactors. They are good enough to maintain a number of delightful objects for the admiration and pleasure of us poor men; and not to reap all the admiration and pleasure that they yield, is to be ungrateful to our benefactors.”

Sir Leicester seemed to approve of this sentiment highly. “An artist, sir?”

“No,” returned Mr. Skimpole. “A perfectly idle man. A mere amateur.”

Sir Leicester seemed to approve of this even more. He hoped he might have the good fortune to be at Chesney Wold when Mr. Skimpole next came down into Lincolnshire. Mr. Skimpole professed himself much flattered and honored.

“Mr. Skimpole mentioned,” pursued Sir Leicester, addressing himself again to my guardian; “mentioned to the housekeeper, who, as he may have observed, is an old and attached retainer of the family—”

(“That is, when I walked through the house the other day, on the occasion of my going down to visit Miss Summerson and Miss Clare,” Mr. Skimpole airily explained to us.)

“That the friend with whom he had formerly been staying there, was Mr. Jarndyce.” Sir Leicester bowed to the bearer of that name. “And hence I became aware of the circumstance for which I have professed my regret. That this should have occurred to any gentleman, Mr. Jarndyce, but especially a gentleman formerly known to Lady Dedlock, and indeed claiming some distant connection with her, and for whom (as I learn from my Lady herself) she entertains a high respect, does, I assure you, give—Me—pain.”

“Pray say no more about it, Sir Leicester,” returned my guardian. “I am very sensible, as I am sure we all are, of your consideration. Indeed the mistake was mine, and I ought to apologise for it.”

I had not once looked up. I had not seen the visitor, and had not even appeared to myself to hear the conversation. It surprises me to find that I can recall it, for it seemed to make no impression on me as it passed. I heard them speaking, but my mind was so confused, and my