and Mr. Grey refreshed himself, after this domestic attack, with a glass of claret.
Mr. Grey was a gentleman who had succeeded, when the heat of youth was over, to the enjoyment of a life-interest in an estate of about £2000 per annum. He was a man of distinguished literary abilities, and he had hailed with no slight pleasure, his succession to a fortune, which, though limited in its duration, was still a very great thing for a young litérateur about town; not only with no profession, but with a mind utterly unfitted for every species of business. Grey, to the astonishment of his former friends, the wits, made an excellent domestic match; and, leaving the whole management of his household to his lady, felt himself as independent in his magnificent library, as if he had never ceased to be that true freeman, a man of chambers.
The young Vivian had not, by the cares
