reading an attack on some dear friend, some "poor dear lady This, or Mrs. That, so horribly shewn up on Sundays!" The men gloat over the papers in their clubs, consoled for the censure on themselves by that on their associates; and the women peruse them in the privacy of their boudoirs, or dressing-rooms, disclaiming, among their acquaintances, ever having seen the abominable paper."

In London, any woman in a brilliant position may lose her reputation in a week, without having even imagined a dereliction from honour. There is so much médisance continually going on; people are, at once, so idle and malicious, that they seize with avidity on every new subject of scandal; and repeat it so often, that they end by not only making others believe, but by believing it themselves.

A gentleman being seen thrice with a lady in public, and as many times with her husband,

is sufficient to lay the foundation of a superstructure of scandal that will defy the possibility of refutation.

Each individual of the idle and malicious persons who love to propagate such tales, will repeat, wherever they go, "Have you seen Lord D and Lady E-? How they are shewing themselves up! they are never asunder."

This slander circulated at three or four clubs, where female reputations are lost with as much facility as fortunes, and retailed at half-a-dozen fashionable parties, sets the whole town talking; and poor Lady E- finds herself the general topic, because she was thrice attended by Lord D in public, though perhaps in private they had never met once.

Lord E is then held up either as a dupe or as an accomplice in his wife's guilt; for guilt is immediately presumed. He is

pitied by one, blamed by another, and laughed at by nearly all; for even the pitiers cannot resist a laugh at a dishonoured husband. Lady E is cried up, or rather cried down, as a most vile and vicious woman, though an idea of vice had probably never entered her head; or else she is compassionated as a victim to the carelessness of a husband, who was so wicked as to permit her to be thrice attended in public by Lord D; and who had himself been seen twice arm-in-arm with that nobleman,— an occurrence which is received as a proof of his cognisance of the liaison.

The lady's reputation is gone, the husband's character suspected, the supposed lover is envied by his contemporary beaux; and the affair furnishes conversation until some other reputation is offered up as a sacrifice on the altar of scandal.

Lady E― is not, however, expelled from

society by her supposed guilt. Oh, no! as long as her husband countenances her, she is received as before; her acquaintances, being content with proclaiming her fault, desire not its punishment. If she happens to have a good disposition, her consciousness of innocence disposes her to believe every accused woman equally free from guilt as herself. She, consequently, pities, and associates with some of the most unworthy of her sex; and so puts the seal on her own supposed culpability. If, on the contrary, hers is not an amiable nature, this undeserved bereavement of reputation will make her slight the substance of the virtue of which she has lost the shadow: and she ends by becoming what she was previously only suspected to be. This is the state of London fashionable society, where appearances alone are judged; where not cause, but effect, is

denounced; and where not crime, but its ex

posure, is punished.

Instances not unfrequently occur of women, free from any more serious charges than levity and imprudence, being subjected to the penalty that ought to be awarded to guilt alone. I refer to cases where the reports circulated through coteries and clubs are afterwards inserted in newspapers; one of which, containing the scandalous charges, is sent by some malicious person to the husband.

His amour propre, if not amour for her, is incurably wounded. If he is a weak man, and the majority of fashionable men are weak, he concludes that her conduct must have been indeed glaringly indecorous, or it never could have obtained such odious publicity; not reflecting, that the statement he has perused is only an exaggerated version of the gossip of