He nearly always wore riding dress in preference to the more fashionable pantaloons and Hessians, tied his cravat in the plainest of styles, would permit only a modicum of starch to stiffen his very moderate shirt points, wholly disdained such fopperies as seals, fobs, or quizzing glasses, and offended his tailor by insisting on having his coats cut so that he could shrug himself into them without the assistance of his valet. He had been heard to express the hope that heaven would forbid he should ever be mistaken for one of the dandy set, but, as his friend Mr. Cyprian Wychbold kindly pointed out to him, there was not the least need for heavenly intervention in the matter. The dandies, said Mr. Wychbold with some severity, were distinguished as much for their polished address as for their exquisite apparel, and were in general an amiable set of men, whose polite manners and winning graces made them acceptable in any drawing room. As Mr. Rivenhall’s notion of making himself agreeable in company was to treat with cold civility anyone for whom he felt no particular liking, and his graces, far from winning, included a trick of staring out of countenance those who pretensions he deprecated, and of uttering blighting comments which put an abrupt end to social intercourse, he stood in far greater danger (Mr. Wychbold said) of being mistaken for a Yahoo.

As he shut the door behind him, his mother looked up, started slightly, and said with a nervous inflection which annoyed her brother: “Oh! Charles! Only fancy! Your uncle Horace!”

“So Dassett informed me,” responded Mr. Rivenhall. “How do you do, sir?”

He shook hands with his uncle, drew up a chair, and sat down, civilly engaging Sir Horace in conversation. His mother, fidgeting first with the fringe of her shawl and then with her handkerchief, presently broke in on this interchange to say, “Charles, you remember Sophia? Your little cousin!”