Among the very few traits of amiability that Major Keene had ever displayed, were the sacrifices of personal convenience he would make for Harry Molyneux. He had given up a good many engagements to see his comrade through that especial hour; and, if the day had left any available geniality in him, it was sure to come out then. Upon this occasion, however, he was remarkably silent, and answered several times at random as if his thoughts were roving elsewhere: they were not unpleasant ones, apparently, for he smiled twice or thrice to himself, much less icily than usual. At last he spoke abruptly, after a long pause—Miss Tresilyan's name had not once been mentioned—"Hal, you know that old hackneyed phrase, about 'a woman to die for?' I think we have seen one to-day who is worth living for; which is saying a good deal more."

"You like her, then?" Molyneux asked.

"Yes—I—like—her." The words came out as if each one had been weighed to a grain; and his lip put on that curious smile once more.

Harry did not feel quite satisfied. He would have preferred hearing more, and inferring less; but acting upon his invariable rose-colored principle, he would not admit any disagreeable surmises, and went to bed under the impression that "it was all right," and that Royston was in a fair way toward being repaid for the sacrifices he had made to friendship.



CHAPTER VII.

The Saturday night is waning, but Molyneux shows no signs of moving yet from Keene's apartments. He has been a model of prudence though so far, as to his drinks, and, in good truth, their companion is not amusing, or instructive, or convivial enough, to tempt or to excuse transgression.

Dick Tresilyan looks about twenty-five, strongly and somewhat heavily built; rather over the middle height, even with the decided stoop of his broad, round shoulders. He carries far too much flesh to please a professional eye, and by the time he is fifty will be very unwieldy; but there is more activity in him than might be supposed, and he walks strongly and well, as you would find if you tried to keep pace with him through the turnips on a sultry September day. His face, without a pretension to beauty in itself, suggests it—just the face that makes you say, "that man must have a handsome sister;" indeed, it bears an absurdly strong family likeness to Cecil's, amounting to a parody. But the outline of feature which in her is so fine and clear, is dull and filled out even to coarseness. It reminded one of looking at the same landscape, first through the medium of a bright blue sky, and then through driving mist, when crag, and cliff, and wood still show themselves, but blurred and dimly. His hair and eyes are, by several shades, the lighter of the two. The great difference is in the mouth. Cecil's is so delicately chiseled, so apt at all expressions, from tender to provocative, that many consider it one of her best points; her brother's is so weak and undecided in its character (or rather want of character), that it would make a more intellectual face vacuous and inane.

The "Tresilyan constitution" holds its own gallantly against the inroads of hardish living, and Dick looks the picture of rude health. Men endowed with an invincible obtuseness of intellect and feeling, have no mental wear and tear, and if the machine starts in good order, it seems as if it might last out indefinitely; so it would, I dare say, if it were not for a propensity to drink, and otherwise to abuse their bodily advantages, peculiar to this class. But for this neutralizing element in their composition perhaps they would live as long as crows or elephants, and we should be visited by a succession of stupid Old Parrs; which would be a very dreadful dispensation indeed. The present subject takes a good deal of exercise, to be sure, and naturally, few cares have ever troubled him; he has always had more money than he knew what to do with, and—as for serious annoyances, a certain train of thought is necessary to form them, while our poor Dick's brain is utterly incapable of holding more than one idea at a time. Whatever may happen to be the dominant thought, reigns with an undivided empire, and will not endure a rival even near its throne, till it is violently thrust out and annihilated by its successor, on the principle of

The priest that slays the slayer, And shall himself be slain.

He never originates a conception, of course, but is always open to a fair offer in the way of a suggestion from any body, and adopts it with the blind zeal of a proselyte. It follows that chance occurrences may bother him for the moment, but he is saved an infinity of trouble by being independent of foresight and memory. To this last defect there is one exception. If he is crossed, or vexed, or injured, he cherishes against the offender a dull, misty, purposeless sort of resentment, scarcely amounting to animosity, but can not explain, either to you or to himself, why he does so. Fortunately he is tolerably harmless and unsuspicious, for to reconcile him would be simply impossible.

Not one mesalliance could be detected in the main line of the Tresilyans; but there must have been a blot somewhere, a link of base metal in the golden chain, of which an adulteress and her confessor could have told. Perhaps the son of the transgressor bore no stigma on his forehead, and ruffled it among his peers as bravely as the best of them, never witting of his mother's dishonor; but the stain had come out in this generation. Even the faults and vices of that strong, stubborn race were curiously distorted and caricatured in their representative. His pride, for instance, chiefly displayed itself in a taste for low company, where he could safely lord it over his inferiors. He did this whenever he had a chance, but, to do him justice, by no means in an ill-natured or bullying way. He had resided almost entirely on his own estates; and, during his rare visits to London, had not extended his knowledge of the world beyond the experience that may be picked up by frequenting divers equivocal places of public resort, and from occasional forays on the extreme frontier of the demi-monde. The result was, that in general society he felt himself in a false position, and was evidently anxious to escape into a more congenial atmosphere.

Can you guess why I have lingered so long over a portrait that might well have been dispatched in three lines? It is because, in the eyes of those who knew Cecil Tresilyan, some interest must attach itself to the basest thing that bears her name; it is because there are men alive who think that the broidery of her skirt, or the trimming of her mantle, deserve describing better than the shield of Pelides; who hold that one of her dark chestnut tresses is worthier of a place among the stars than imperial Berenice's hair. A lame excuse, I admit, to the many that never saw her—even in their dreams.

On this particular evening Dick was supremely happy. Keene had got him upon shooting—the only subject on which that unlucky man could talk without committing himself; and, by the time he was well into his fourth tumbler of iced Cogniac and water, he was achieving a rare conversational triumph; for he had left off answering monosyllabically, had volunteered an observation or two, and even ventured to banter his companions about their not availing themselves sufficiently of the sporting resources in the neighborhood.

"There are several boars near here," he was saying; "they shoot them sometimes, and you can go if you manage properly. I wonder you men never found that out."

"Ah! they did talk a good deal about pigs," Royston remarked indifferently. "But, you see, we used to stick them in the Deccan. The first time I heard of their way of doing it here, I felt very like Deering when they asked him to shoot a fox in Scotland. Tom Deering, you know, the old boy that has hunted with the Warwickshire and Atherstone for thirty seasons, and could tell you the names, ages, and colors of the hounds better than he could those of his own small family—pedigrees, too, I shouldn't wonder."

Dick tried to look as if he had known the man from his childhood, and succeeded but very moderately.

"Well," the other went on, "they were beating a cover for roe, and the gillie suggested a particular pass, as the most likely to get a shot at what he called a 'tod.' It was some time before Tom realized the full horror of the proposition: when he did, he shut his eyes like a bull that is going to charge, and literally fell upon the duinhe-wassel, bellowing savagely. He had no more idea of using his hands than a fractious baby; but it is rather a serious thing when sixteen stone of solid flesh becomes possessed by a devil. Robin Oig was overborne by the onset, and did not forget the effects of it that season."

Tresilyan laughed applaudingly, as he always did when he could understand more than half a story.

"I suppose it's pretty good fun hunting them out there?" he said, going off at score, as usual, on the fresh theme.

"Not bad," Keene replied; "sharp going while it lasts, and a little knack wanted to stick them scientifically. Some say it's more exciting than fox-hunting, but that's childish; I never heard a man assert it whose liver was not on the wane. It's more dangerous, certainly. A header into the Smite or the Whissendine is nothing to a fall backward into a nullah, with a beaten horse on the top of you."

Molyneux woke up from a reverie. The familiar word stirred his blood like a trumpet, and it flashed up brightly in his pale cheek as he spoke. "Ah! we have had a brushing gallop or two in the gay old times, before we got married, and invalided, and all that sort of thing. Dick, I should like to tell you how I got my first spear."

"Of course you would," the major said, resignedly; "it's my fault for starting the subject. Get over it quickly then, please." He did not stop him, though, as he would have done on another occasion—pour cause.

"I had been entered some time at boar," Harry began, "before I had any luck at all. Ride as hard as I would at the start, the old hands would creep up at the finish, just in time to get 'first blood.' I gave long prices for my Arabs, too, and didn't spare them. I own I got discouraged, and thought the whole thing a robbery, a delusion, and a snare. One day, however, we had a good deal of deep, marshy ground at first, and a quick gallop afterward, which served my light weight well. I had it all to myself when he came to bay; so I went in, full of confidence, and gave point, as I thought, well behind the shoulder-blade. I did not calculate on the pace we were going, and I was just three inches too forward. My horse was as young and hot as I was, and though he had no idea of flinching, didn't know how to take care of himself. The instant the brute felt the steel he wheeled short round, and cut The Emperor's forelegs clean from under him. We all came down in a heap; my spear flew yards away; and there I was on my face, clear of my horse, with my right wrist badly sprained. Would you have fancied the position? I didn't. The devil was too blown to begin offensive operations at once, for we had burst him along pretty sharply, but he stood right over me, champing and rasping his tusks, and getting his wind for a good vicious rip. I felt his boiling foam dropping upon me as I lay quite still. I thought that was the best thing to do. All at once hoofs came up at a hard gallop; something swept above me with a rush; there was a short, smothered sound like a tap on a padded door, and then the beast stretched himself slowly out across my legs, and shivered, and died. That man opposite to you had leapt his horse over us both, and, while he was in the air, speared the boar through the spinal marrow. If he had been struck any where else he might still have torn me badly before the life was out of him. Neatly done, wasn't it?"

Harry drank off the remains of his sherry and seltzer rather excitedly, and then sighed. He was thinking how often, in other days, when health and nerves were to the fore, he had drained a stronger and deeper draught to "Snaffle, spur, and spear!"

"A mere stage trick," Keene remarked; "effective, but not in the least dangerous, with a horse under you as steady as poor old Mahmoud. May his rest be glorious! Gilbert killed a tiger that had got loose in the same way, which was something to talk about, for even clean-bred Arabs don't like facing tigers. You made rather better time than usual over that story to-night, Hal; it's practice, I suppose."

Tresilyan's eyes fastened on the speaker, full of a heavy, pertinacious admiration. You might have told him of the noblest action of generosity or self-denial that ever constituted the stock in trade of a moral hero, and he would have listened patiently, but without one responsive emotion. Bodily prowess and daring he could appreciate. Keene's physical prestige was just the thing to captivate his limited imagination; besides which the ground was prepared for the seed-time. He had some soldier friends, and dining with these at the "Swashing Buckler," he had heard some of those club chronicles in which the Cool Captain's name figured prominently.

The latter interpreted perfectly well the gaze that was riveted upon him, without being in the least flattered by it. He felt, perhaps, the same sort of satisfaction that one experiences when, fighting for the odd trick, the first card in our hand is a heavy trump. Dick's thorough and undivided allegiance once secured, was a good card in the game he was playing at the moment. Whatever his thoughts might have been, his face told no tales. He had been flooring glass for glass with his guest till the liquor began to work its way into the cracks even of such a seasoned vessel; but, for any outward or visible sign in feature, speech, or manner, he might have been assisting at a teetotaller's soiree.

Very often—late on guest-nights, or other tournaments of deep drinking, where Trojan and Tyrian met to do battle for the credit of their respective corps—the calm, rigid face, never flushing beyond a clear swarthy brown, and the cold, bright, inevitable eyes, had stricken terror into the hearts of bacchanalian Heavies, and given consolation, if not confidence, to the Hussars, who were failing fast: these knew that though their own brains might be reeling and their legs rebelliously independent, their single champion was invincible. As the last of the Enomotae went down, he saw Othryades standing steadfastly, with never a trace of wound or weakness, still able and willing to write [Greek: NIKH] on his shield.

When our poor Dick was once thoroughly impressed, for the first time, with awe or admiration, either for man or woman, he generally fell into a species of trance, from which it was exceedingly difficult to bring him round. He would have sat there, staring stupidly, till morning, with perfect satisfaction to himself, if Molyneux had not attacked him with a direct question, "How long do you think of staying at Dorade? And have you made any plans afterward?"

Le mouton qui revait roused himself with an effort, and searched the bottom of his empty glass narrowly for a reply. Eventually he succeeded in finding one:

"Cecil talks about two months; then we are to go on by Nice, Genoa, Florence, Rome, and Naples, and so come back by—Italy." He had got up the first names by rote, and run them off glibly enough, but was evidently at fault about the last one. I fancy he had some vague idea of Austrian troops being quartered in these regions, and looked upon Hesperia in the light of an obscure state or moderate-sized town somewhere in the north of Europe.

Harry was balked in his inclination to laugh; the rising smile was checked upon his lip, just in time, by a glance from his chief, severely authoritative.

"Italy?" the latter said, without a muscle moving; "well, I shouldn't advise you to stay long there. It's rather a small place, and very stupid; no society whatever. The others will amuse you, as you have never seen them."

He rose as he spoke the last words. Perhaps he thought he had done that night "enough for profit and more than enough for glory." The Cool Captain seldom suffered himself to be bored without an adequate object very clearly in view.

"Hal, I am going to turn you out. It is far too late for you to be sitting up, and we have a good deal to do to-morrow."

Molyneux did not quite comprehend what extraordinary labors were before any of them, but he rose without making an objection, and Tresilyan prepared to accompany him. Dick considered that individually he had been remarkably brilliant, and had left a favorable impression behind him. But all this newly-acquired confidence, and much strong drink were not sufficient to embolden him to risk, as yet, a tete-a-tete with Royston Keene.

Long after they had departed the major sat gazing steadfastly at the logs burning on the hearth. If he had gone straight to bed, the enormous dullness of one of the party would have weighed him down like a nightmare.

Is there one of us who can not remember having seen prettier pictures in a flame-colored setting than the Royal Academy has ever shown him? What earthly painter could emulate or imitate the coquettish caprice of light and shadow, that enhances the charms, and dissembles all possible defects in those fair, fleeting Fiamminas? Something like this effect was to be found in the miniatures that were in fashion a dozen years ago; where part only of a sweet face and a dangerously eloquent eye looked at you out of a wreath of dusky cloud, that shrouded all the rest and gave your imagination play. Truly it was not so utterly wrong, the ancient legend that wedded Hephaestus to Aphrodite. The Minnesingers and their coevals spoke fairly enough about Love, and probably had studied their subject; but, rely upon it, passionate Romance died in Germany when once the close stoves prevailed. Don't you envy the imagination of the dreamer who could trace a shape of loveliness in those dreadful glazed tiles?

Being rather a Guebre myself, I once got enthusiastic on the subject in the company of an eccentric character, who very soon made me repent my expansiveness. If he had committed any atrocious crime (he was a small sandy-haired creature, and wore colored spectacles), no one knew of it, and he never hinted at its nature; but his whole ideas seemed tinged with a vague gloomy remorse that made him a sadder, but scarcely a wiser or better man. Perhaps it was a monomania; let us hope so. On that occasion he heard me out quite patiently; then the blue glasses raised themselves to the level of my eyes, and I felt convinced their owner was staring spectrally behind them. Considering that he measured about thirty-four inches round the chest, his voice was extraordinarily deep and solemn: it sounded preternaturally so as he said very slowly, "There is one face that does not often leave me alone here, and will follow me, I think, when I go to my appointed place: I see it now, as I shall see it throughout all ages—always by firelight."

I felt very wroth, for surely to suggest a new and unpleasant train of ideas is an infamous abuse of a tete-a-tete. I told my friend so; and, as he declined to retract or apologize, or in any wise explain himself, departed with the conviction that, though a clever man and an original thinker, he was by no means an exhilarating or instructive companion. I should have borne him a grudge to this day, but as I was walking home, decidedly disconsolate (there's no such bore as having a pet fancy spoiled, it is like having your favorite hunter sent home with two broken knees), it suddenly occurred to me that if the penitent was in the habit of looking at the fire through those blue barnacles, it was not likely there would be much rose-color in his visions. In great triumph I retraced my steps, and knocked the culprit up to put in this "demurrer." I flatter myself it floored him. He did attempt some lame excuse about "taking his spectacles off at such times," but I refused to listen to a word, and marched out of the place with drums beating and colors flying, first exasperating him by the assurance of my complete forgiveness. Since then, if sitting alone, ligna super foco large reponens, I involuntarily recur to that ill-favored conception, it suffices to contrast with it the grotesque appearance of its originator, and the pale phantom evanisheth.

I have no excuse to offer for this long and egotistical anecdote, except the pendant which Maloney used to attach to his ultra-marine stories—"The point of it is, that—it's strictly true."



CHAPTER VIII.

Another and a much more reputable Council of Three sat that night in Miss Tresilyan's apartments. Mr. Fullarton represented the male element there, and was in great force. The late accession to his flock had decidedly raised his spirits: he knew how materially it would strengthen his hands; but, independently of all politic consideration, Cecil's grace and beauty exercised a powerful influence over him. Do not misconstrue this. I believe a thought had never crossed his mind relating to any living woman that his own wife might not have known and approved; nevertheless was it true, that Mr. Fullarton liked his penitents to be fair: not a very eccentric or unaccountable taste either. It is a necessity of our nature to take more delight in the welfare and training of a beautiful and refined being, than in that of one who is coarse and awkward and ugly. Even with the merely animal creation we should experience this; and not above one divine in fifty is more than human, after all.

So, gazing on the fair face and queenly figure that were then before him, and feeling a sort of vested interest in their possessor, the heart of the pastor was merry within him; and he, so to speak, caroused over the profusely-sugared tea and well-buttered galette with a decorous and regulated joviality; ever as he drank casting down the wreaths of his florid eloquence at the feet of his entertainers. In any atmosphere whatsoever, no matter how uncongenial, those garlands were sure to bloom. His zeal was such a hardy perennial that the most chilling reception could not damage its vitality. Principle and intention were both all right, of course, but they were clumsily carried out, and the whole effect was to remind one unpleasantly of the clockmaker puffing his wares. At the most unseasonable times and in the most incongruous places, Mr. Fullarton always had an eye to business, introducing and inculcating his tenets with an assurance and complacency peculiar to himself. Sometimes he would adopt the familiarly conversational, sometimes the theatrically effective style; but it never seemed to cross his mind that either could appear ridiculous or grotesque. Some absurd stories were told of his performances in this line. On one occasion, they say, he addressed his neighbor at dinner, to whom he had just been introduced, abruptly thus: "You see, what we want is—more faith," in precisely the manner and tone of a gourmet suggesting that "the soup would be all the better for a little more seasoning;" or of Mr. Chouler asserting, "the farmers must be protected, sir." On another, meeting for the first time a very pious and wealthy old man (I believe a joint-stock bank director), he proceeded to sound him as to his "experiences." The unsuspecting elder, rather flattered by the interest taken in his welfare, and never dreaming that such communications could be any thing but privileged and confidential, parted with his information pretty freely. Mr. Fullarton was so delighted at what he had heard that he turned suddenly round to the mixed assembly and cried out. "Why, here's a blessed old Barzillai!" His face was beaming like that of an enthusiastic numismatist who stumbles upon a rare Commodus or an authentic Domitian. There were several people present of his own way of thinking; but some, even among those, felt very ill afterward from their efforts to repress their laughter. The miserable individual thus endued with the "robe of honor" would have infinitely preferred the most scandalously abusive epithet to that fervid compliment. He would have parted with half his bank shares at a discount (they were paying about 14 per cent. then—you can get them tolerably cheap now) to have been able to sink into his shoes on the spot; indeed these were almost large enough to form convenient places of refuge. It had a very bad effect on him: he never again unbosomed himself on any subject to man, woman, or child. Even in his last illness—though he must have had one or two troublesome things on his mind, unless he had peculiar ideas, as to the propriety of ruining widows and orphans—he declined to commit himself,

But locked the secret in his breast, And died in silence, unconfessed.

On that Saturday night, to one of the party at all events, Mr. Fullarton's presence was very welcome. Mrs. Danvers was somewhat of a hard drinker in theology, and, like other intemperate people, was not over particular as to the quality of the liquors set before her, provided only that they were hot and strong, and unstinted. The succulent and highly-flavored eloquence to which she was listening suited her palate exactly, besides which, the chaplain's peculiar opinions happened to coincide perfectly with her own. As the evening progressed she got more and more exhilarated; and at length could not forbear intimating "how sincerely she valued the privilege of sitting under so eminent a divine."

The latter made a scientific little bow, elaborated evidently by long practice, expressive at once of gratification and humility.

"A privilege, if such it be, dear Mrs. Danvers, that some of my congregation estimate but very lightly. You would hardly believe how many members of my flock I scarcely know, except by name. It is a sore temptation to discouragement. I fear that Major Keene's pernicious example is indeed contagious, and that his evil communications have corrupted many—alas! too many." He rounded off the period with a ponderous professional sigh.

Miss Tresilyan was leaning back in her arm-chair: as the wood-fire sprang up brightly and sank again suddenly, her great deep eyes seemed to flash back the fitful gleams. It was long since she had spoken. In truth, she had been drawing largely upon her piety at first, to make herself feel interested, and, when this failed, upon her courtesy, to appear so; but she was conscious of relapses more and more frequent into the dreary regions of Boredom. Every body would agree with every body else so completely! A bold contradiction, a stinging sarcasm, or a caustic retort, would have been worth any thing just then to take off the cloying taste of the everlasting honey. She roused herself at these last words enough to ask languidly, "What has he done?"

There could not be a simpler question, nor one put more carelessly; but it was rather a "facer" to Mr. Fullarton, who dealt in generalities as a rule, and objected to being brought to book about particulars—considering, indeed, such a line of argument as indicative of a caviling and narrow-minded disposition in his interlocutor.

"Well," he said, not without hesitation, "Major Keene has only once been to church; and, I believe, has spoken scoffingly since of the discourse he heard delivered there. Yet I may say I was more than usually 'supported' on that occasion." The man's thorough air of conviction softened somewhat the absurd effect of his childish vanity.

Cecil would have been sorry to confess how much excuse she felt inclined to admit just then for the sins both of commission and omission—sins that, at another time, when her faculties were fresh and her judgment unbiassed, she might have looked upon as any thing but venial. Ah! Mr. Fullarton, the seed you have scattered so profusely to-night is beginning to bear fruit already you never dreamed of. Beet-root and turnips will not succeed on every soil. It must be long before a remunerative crop of these can be gathered from the breezy upland which for centuries, till the heather was burned, has worn a robe of uncommercial but imperial purple.

Nevertheless, Miss Tresilyan frowned perceptibly. It looked very much as if Keene had been amusing himself at her expense when he affected an interest in her leading the choir. Unwittingly to "make sport for the men of war in Gath" by no means suited the fancy of that haughty ladye.

"It is very wrong of him not to come to church," she observed after a pause (for the sin of sarcasm disapproval was not so ready, and she made the most of scanty means of condemnation). "Yet I scarcely think he can be actively hostile. You know he almost lives with the Molyneuxs, and has great influence with them. Do they not attend regularly?"

Mr. Fullarton admitted that they did. "But," said he, "constant intercourse with such a man must ere long have its injurious effect. Indeed, I felt it my bounden duty to warn Mrs. Molyneux on the subject. I grieve to say she treated my admonition with a very unwarrantable levity."

Mrs. Danvers's sympathetic groan was promptly at the service of the speaker; fortunately, turning to thank her for it by a look, he missed detecting her pupil's smile. She could fancy so well Fanny's little moue, combining amusement, vexation, and impertinence, while undergoing the ecclesiastical censure.

"You must be merciful to Mrs. Molyneux," she remarked, with a demure gravity that did her credit under the circumstances. "She is my greatest friend, you know. When a wife is so very fond of her husband, surely there is some excuse for her adopting his prejudices for and against people?"

The pastor brightened up suddenly: he had just recollected another fact to fire off against the bete noir.

"I forgot to tell you that Major Keene is much addicted to play, and, besides, is intimate with the Vicomte de Chateaumesnil. Noscitur a sociis." The reverend man was an indifferent classic, but he had a way of flashing scraps out of grammars and Analecta Minora before women and others unlikely to be down upon him, as if they were quotations from some recondite author.

"You can not mean that cripple who is drawn about in a wheel-chair?" Cecil asked. "We saw him to-day, only for a moment, for he drew his cloak over his face as we passed. I never saw such a melancholy wreck, and I pitied him so much that I fear he will haunt me."

Far deeper would have been the compassion had she guessed at the pang that shot straight to Armand's heart as he veiled his blasted features and haggard eyes, feeling bitterly that such as he were not worthy to look upon her in the glory of her brilliant beauty.

"A notorious atheist and profligate," was the reply. "We can not regard his sore affliction in any other light than a judgment—a manifest judgment, dear Miss Tresilyan."

There was grave disapproval and just a shade of contempt in the face of one of his hearers as she said, "The hand of God is laid so heavily there that man may surely forbear him." But Mrs. Danvers struck in to her favorite's rescue, rejoicing in an opportunity of displaying her partisanship.

"A judgment, of course. It would be sinful to doubt it. Besides, do not others suffer?" (She cast up her eyes here pointedly, as though she said, "There may be more perfect saints, but if you want a fair specimen of the fine old English martyr—me voici.") "Cecil, my love, I wonder you did not perceive Major Keene's true character at once. You were talking to him a good deal the other day."

"He did not favor me with any remarkably heretical opinions," Miss Tresilyan replied, carelessly. "Perhaps they have been exaggerated. At all events, he is not likely to do us much harm. Don't you think we are safe, Bessie? Dick does not care much for play; and his ideas on religious subjects are so very simple that it would be hard to unsettle them."

Clearly she thought the topic was exhausted, but it had a strange fascination for Mr. Fullarton. One of the many good-natured people, who especially abound in those semi-English Continental towns, had been kind enough to quote or misquote to him a remark of Royston's about that sermon; and on this topic the chaplain was very vulnerable. He would have forgiven a real substantial injury far sooner than a depreciation of his discourses.

Was he one whit weaker or more susceptible than his fellows? I think not. All the philosophy on earth will not teach us to endure without wincing a mosquito's bite. The hardiest hero bears about him one spot where an ivy-leaf clinging intercepted the petrifying water—a tiny out-of-the-way spot, not very near the head or heart, but palpable enough to be stricken by Paris's arrow or Hagen's spear. Caesar is very sensitive about that bald crown of his, and fears lest even the laurel wreath should cover it but meagrely. Many wars, since that which brought Ilium to the dust, might have been traced to slighted vanity, and many excellent Christians have waxed quite as wroth as the queen of heathenish heaven about the spretae injuria formae. (Do you think this is a peculiarly feminine failing? I have seen a first-class man and Ireland scholar look massacres at the child of his bosom friend, when the unconscious innocent made disagreeable remarks on his personal appearance, alluding particularly to the shape of his nose, which was not Phidian. He has since been heard to speak of that terrible deed in Bethlehem as a painful but justifiable measure of political expediency; and is inclined, on many grounds, to excuse and sympathize with the stem Idumean.) The insult offered to the embassador in Tarentum was only the outbreak of a single drunkard's brutality, but all the wealth of the fair city of Phalanthus did not suffice to pay the account for washing the soiled robe white again; and blood enough ran down her streets to have quenched some blazing temples before the Romans would give her a receipt in full.

Arguing from these data, we may conclude that Mr. Fullarton was laboring under a slight delusion in believing (which he did sincerely) that only a pure and disinterested zeal for the welfare of his flock impelled him to say, "I shall make it my business to inquire more fully into Major Keene's antecedents. I am convinced there is something discreditable in the background, and it may be well to be armed with proofs in case of need."

Though he may have deceived himself completely as to the nature of the spirit that possessed him, Cecil Tresilyan was more clear-sighted. She had not failed to remark a certain vicious twinkle in the speaker's eye and a deeper flush on his ruddy countenance, betokening rather a mundane resentment. Her lip began to curl.

"How very disagreeable some of your duties must be. No doubt you interpret them correctly, but in this case perhaps it would be well to be quite sure before acting on the offensive. If I were a man—even a clergyman—I don't think I should like to have Major Keene for my declared enemy."

The text with which the chaplain enforced his reply—expressive of a determination to keep his own line at all hazards, strong in the rectitude of his cause—had better not be quoted here, especially as it was not apposite enough to "lay" the contradictory spirit that was alive in his fair opponent. (How very angry Cecil would have been if she had been told ten minutes ago that such an expression would apply to her!) The temptation to answer sharply was so powerful that she took refuge in distant coldness.

"You quite misunderstand me, Mr. Fullarton. I never dreamed of offering advice; it would have been excessively presumptuous in me, especially as I have not the faintest interest in the subject we have been talking about. Need we discuss it any longer? I think Major Keene has been too highly honored already."

That weary look was so manifest now on the beautiful face that even the chaplain, albeit tenacious of his position as a sea-anemone, felt that, for once, he had overstaid his time and was periling his popularity. So, after an expansive benediction, and an entreaty that they would be early at church on the morrow, he went "to his own place."

With a sigh of admiration—"What an excellent man, and how well he talks!" said Bessie Danvers.

With a sigh of relief—"He talks a great deal, and it is very late," said Cecil Tresilyan.



CHAPTER IX.

From his "coign of vantage" in the reading-desk the next morning, Mr. Fullarton surveyed a crowded congregation, serenely complacent and hopeful, as a farmer in August looking down from the hill-side on golden billows of waving grain. Visitors had been pouring in rather fast during the week; and there was a vague, general impression, which no individual would have owned, that they were to hear something unusually good. For once expectation was not to be disappointed—a remarkable fact, when one considers how much dissatisfaction is created, as a rule, in the popular mind, by the shortcomings of eclipses, processions, Vesuvian eruptions, new operas, and other advertised attractions, natural and artificial. The singing was really a success. Miss Tresilyan's magnificent voice did its duty nobly, and did no more. Without overpowering or singling itself out from the others, it lured them on to follow where they could never have gone alone: the choir was kept in perfect order without even knowing that it was disciplined.

There was an elderly Englishman who had resided at Dorade ever since he had a slight difference of opinion with the Bankruptcy Court a quarter of a century back. Drifting helplessly and aimlessly about Europe in search of employment, he had taken root where he came ashore, and vegetated, as floating weeds will do. He picked up rather a precarious livelihood by acting as a species of factotum to his countrymen in the season, ministering, not injudiciously, to their myriad whims and necessities. Among his multifarious functions, perhaps the most respectable and permanent was that of clerk to the English chapel. He was by no means a very religious man, nor were his morals quite unexceptionable, but he had completely identified himself with the fortunes and interests of that modest building. A sneer at its capabilities or a doubt as to its prospects would exasperate him at any time far more than a direct insult to himself (to be sure there was little self-respect left to be offended). When disguised in drink, which was the case tolerably often, he generally proposed to settle the question by the ordeal of battle, and was only to be appeased by an apology or a great deal more liquor.

On this occasion the success and the singing combined—for excess and hardship had not quite deadened a good ear for music—moved the old castaway strangely. His thoughts wandered back to the misused days when he had friends, and a position, and character; when he was a householder and vestryman, and even dreamt ambitiously of a churchwardenship. He could see distinctly his own pew, with the gray, worm-eaten panels, where he had sat many and many a warm afternoon, resisting sternly, as became a man of mark in the parish, treacherous inclinations to slumber. He saw the ponderous brown gallery—eyesore to archaeologists—which held the village choir: there they were, with the sun streaming in on their heads through the western window, till even the faded red cushion in front deepened into rich crimson, chanting their quaint old anthems with right good courage, though every one got lost in the second line, and, after much independent exertion of the lungs, just came up in time to join in the grand final rally. He saw the mild-faced, gray-haired parson mounting slowly the pulpit stairs, adjusting and manoeuvring the refractory gown that would come off his shoulders with the nervous gesture which, beginning in timidity, had grown into a habit that was part of the man. More plainly than all—he saw a low, green mound, just beyond the chancel walls, where one was sleeping who had lavished on him all the treasures of a rare, unselfish, trusting love; the dear, meek, little wife, who was so proud of her husband's few poor talents, so indulgent to his many failings, who ever had an excuse ready to answer his self-reproaches, whose weak, thin hand was always strong enough to pluck him back from ruin and dishonor, till it grew stiff and cold. She knew it, too, for he remembered the wail that burst from her lips when she thought she was alone, the night before she died—"Ah! who will save him now that I am gone?" How miserable and lonely he was long after they buried her! How incessantly he used to repeat those last words, meant to be comforting, that she spoke, with her arm wound round his neck, "Darling, you have been so very, very kind to me!" So it went on, till the devil of drink, choosing his time cunningly, entered into him, and battled with and drove out the angel. A strange resurrection! Memories that had died years ago, withering from very shame, began to curl and twine themselves round the hard, battered heart as tenderly as ever. These pictures of the past were still vivid and clear, when he became aware of a dimness in his eyes that blinded them to all real surrounding objects; he felt so surprised that it broke the spell; tears had almost forgotten the way to his eyes.

Not very probable, is it, that a prosaic elderly clerk should dream of all this during the three last verses of a hymn? Well, the steadiest imagination is apt to disregard sometimes the proprieties of place; and as for space—of course the visions of the night are quicker on the wing than their rivals of the day; yet there must be some analogy, and, they say, we pass through the vicissitudes of half a lifetime in the few seconds before we wake.

Cecil was really pleased with the result of the singing. She would have been even more so had it not been for the marked expression of approval on the face of Royston Keene. It was evident she had been on her trial. The cool, tranquil, appreciative smile was very provoking. It made her feel for the moment like a prima donna on her first appearance at a new theatre.

Unusually eloquent and verbose was the sermon that day, for not only was the preacher aware that bright eyes looked upon his deeds, but he saw his enemies in the front of the battle. Surely all extemporaneous speakers, in court, pulpit, or senate, must be accessible to such external influences. It ought not to be so, of course, but I fancy it is. Would John Knox have been so fiery in denunciation if those wicked maids of honor had not derided him? I doubt if a discourse delivered in a Union would ever soar to sublimity, even if the excellent paupers could be supposed to understand it. So, with every sentence more plaintive grew Mr. Fullarton's lamentations over worldlings and their vanities, more bitter his invectives against those who, having themselves broken out of the fold, seek to lead others astray. An occasional gesture—something too expressive—was not needed to point his animadversions. The object of them sat with his head slightly bent, neither by frown nor smile betraying that a single allusion had gone home. The simple truth was, that he scarcely caught one word. The last cadence of sweeter tones was still lingering in his ears, and had locked them fast against all other sounds. The energetic divine might have poured out upon his guilty head yet stormier vials, and he would never have heard one roll of the thunder. However, the dearest friends must part, and all orations must come to an end, except those of the much-desiderated Chisholm Anstey, of whom an old-world parliament was not worthy; so, after "a burst of forty-five minutes without a check," the chaplain dismissed his beloved hearers to their digestion.

The stream, as it flowed out, divided, and broke up into small pools of conversation. Miss Tresilyan and her chaperone joined the Molyneux party, just as Fanny was saying to Keene that "she hoped he would profit by much in the sermon that was evidently meant for him."

"Was he personal?" the latter asked, so indifferently; "I didn't notice it. Well, I suppose it amuses him, and it certainly does not hurt me." (Mrs. Danvers sniffed indignantly—a form of protest to which her nose, from its construction, was eminently adapted; but he went on before she could speak) "Miss Tresilyan, will you allow perhaps the unworthiest member of the congregation to express an opinion that the singing went off superbly?"

Her beautiful eyes glittered somewhat disdainfully. "Thank you, you are very good. But I think you have hardly a right to be critical. I should like to have some one's opinion who is really interested in the chapel. It was scarcely worth taking so much trouble to appear so the other day. You know what Liston said about the penny? 'It is not the value of the thing, but one hates to be imposed upon.' Delusions are not so agreeable as illusions, Major Keene."

Royston was very much pleased. He liked above all things to see a woman stand up to him defiantly; indeed, if they were worth "setting to with," he always tried to get them to spar as soon as possible, to find out if they had any idea of hitting straight. He did not betray his satisfaction, though, as he answered quite calmly, "Pardon me, I could not be so impertinent as to attempt a 'delusion' on so short an acquaintance. I deny the charge distinctly. I believe that residence in Dorade, and a certain amount of subscription, constitute a member of Mr. Fullarton's congregation, and give one a franchise. He has not thought fit to excommunicate me publicly as yet. I really was interested in the subject, for I fully meant to go to church this morning, and I mean to go again."

Insensibly they had walked on in advance of the others. She shook her head with a saucy incredulity—"I am no believer in sudden conversions."

"Nor I; I was not speaking of such; but I am very fond of good singing, and I would go any where to hear it. Did our chaplain include hypocrisy among my other disqualifications for decent society last night? I understand he is good enough to furnish a catalogue of them to all new comers."

Cecil certainly had not abused him then; so there was not the slightest necessity for her looking guilty and conscious, both of which she felt she was doing as she replied—"I am sure Mr. Fullarton would not asperse any one's character knowingly. He could only speak from a sense of duty, perhaps not a pleasant one."

"Quite so," said Royston; "I don't quarrel with him for any fair professional move. If he thinks it necessary or expedient to prejudice indifferent people against me, he is clearly right to do so. Ah! I see, you think I dislike him. I don't, indeed. Morally and physically, he seems a little too unctuous, that's all. Capital clergyman for a cold climate! Fancy how useful he would be in an Arctic expedition. They might save his salary in Arnott's stoves: I'm certain he radiates."

Miss Tresilyan knew that it was wrong to smile. But she had an unfortunately quick perception of the ridiculous, and the struggles of principle against a sense of humor were not always successful. She would not give up her point, though. "I can not think that you judge him fairly," she persisted.

"Perhaps not; but there is a large class who would scarcely be much moved by stronger and abler words than, I suppose, we heard to-day—spoken as they were spoken. These preachers won't study the fitness of things; that's the worst of it. I have known a garrison chaplain deliver a discourse that, I am convinced, was composed for a visitation. It seems absurd to hear a man warning us against a particular sin, and threatening us with all sorts of penalties if we indulge in it, when it is impossible that he himself should ever have felt the temptation. We want some one who can find out the harmless side of our character, as well as the diseased part, and work upon it. Such a person may be as strict and harsh as he pleases, but he is listened to." He paused for a moment, and went on in a graver tone—"I think it might have done even me some good, when I was younger, to have talked for half an hour with the man who wrote 'How Amyas threw his sword away.'"

Cecil could not disagree with him now, nor did she wish to do so. She liked those last words of his better than any he had spoken. Remember, she was born and bred in the honest west country, where one, at least, of their own prophets hath honor. If you want to indulge your enthusiasm for the Rector of Eversley, let your next walking-tour turn thitherward; for on all the sea-board from Portsmouth to Penzance, there is never a woman—maid, wife, or widow—that will say you nay.

Keene saw his advantage, but was far too wise to follow it up then. The weaker sex, as a rule, are acute but not very close reasoners; they mix up their majors and minors with a charming recklessness; and, if innocent of nothing else, are generally guiltless of a syllogism. It follows that, in the course of an argument, it is easy enough to entangle them in their talk. When such a chance occurs, don't come down on your pretty antagonist with "I thought you said so and so," but be politic as well as generous, and pass it by. They will do more justice to your self-denial than they would have done to your dialectic talents. Corinna loves to be contradicted, but hates to be convinced, and dreads no monster so much as a short-horned—dilemma. She may forgive the first offense as inadvertent, but "one more such victory and you are lost." Think how often clemency has succeeded where severity would have failed. What did that discreet Eastern emir, when he found his fair young wife sleeping in a garden, where she had no earthly business to be? He laid his drawn sabre softly across her neck, and retired without breaking her slumbers. The cold blade was the first thing Zuleika felt when she woke; I can not guess what her sensations were; but when she gave the weapon back to her solemn lord, she pressed her rosy lips thrice on the blue steel, and made a vow that she most probably kept; and Hussein Bey never was happier, than when he drew her back to his broad breast, looking into her face silently with his calm, grave smile.

I fancy our sisters enter into an argument with more simple good faith and eagerness than we are wont to indulge in; so that it is probably easier to tease and exasperate them, which is amusing enough while it lasts. But no doubt it hurts them sometimes more than we are aware of; and, after all, breaking a butterfly on the wheel is poor pastime, and not a very athletic sport. The glory, too, to be won is so small that it scarcely compensates for the pain we inflict, and may, perchance, eventually feel. Is Achilles inclined to be proud of the strength of his arm, or the keenness of his falchion, as he grovels in the dust at the slain Amazon's side? Nay, he would give half his laurels to be able to close that awful gaping wound—to see the proud lips soften for a moment from their immutable scorn—to detect the faintest tremor in the long white limbs that never will stir again.

The solemnity of these illustrations, in which battles, murders, and sudden deaths are mingled, will prove that I regard the subject as by no means trivial, but am sincerely anxious to warn my comrades against yielding to a temptation which assails us daily.

On these principles the Cool Captain acted, then. His gay laugh opened a bridge to the retreating enemy as he said, "How my poor character must have been worried last night! I wish Mrs. Molyneux had been there. She is good enough to stand up for her old friend sometimes. I could hardly expect you to take so much trouble for a very recent acquaintance."

"Of course not," replied Cecil. "I was not in a position to contradict any thing, even if I had wished to do so. But, I remember, I thought I would speak to you about my brother. You know enough of him already to guess why I am nervous about him. I almost forced him to take me abroad; and he is exposed to so many more dangers here than at home. Please, don't encourage him to play, or tempt him into any thing wrong. Indeed, I don't mean to speak harshly or uncourteously, so you need not be angry."

She raised her eyes to her companion's with a pretty pleading. He met them fairly. Whatever his intentions might be, no one could say that the major ever shrank from looking friend or foe in the face.

"I am sorry that you should think the warning necessary. Supposing that it were so—on my honor, he is safe from me. I should like to alter your opinion of me, if it were possible. Will you give me a chance?" The others joined them before she could reply; but more than once that day Cecil wondered whether, even during their short acquaintance, she had not sometimes dealt scanty justice to Royston Keene.



CHAPTER X.

There is a pleasant theory—that every woman may be loved, once at least in her life, if she so wills it. It must be true: how, otherwise, can you account for the number of hard-featured visages—lighted up by no redeeming ray of intellect—that preside at "good men's feasts," and confront them at their firesides? How do the husbands manage? Do they, from constantly contemplating an inferior type of creation, lose their comparing and discriminating powers, so that, like the Australian and Pacific aborigines, they come to regard as points of beauty peculiarities that a more advanced civilization shrinks from? Or do their visual organs actually become impaired, like those of captives who can see clearly only in their own dungeon's twilight, and flinch before the full glare of day? If neither of these is the case, they must sometimes sympathize with that dreary dilemma of Bias which the adust Aldrich quotes in grim irony—[Greek: Ei men kalen, exeis koinen, ei d' aischran, poinen] (Whether of the two horns impaled the sage of Priene?) Some, of course, are fully alive to the outward defects of their partners; but few are so candid as the old Berkshire squire, who, looking after his spouse as she left the room, said, pensively, "Excellent creature, that! I've liked her better every day for twenty years, but I've always thought she's the plainest-headed woman in England!" Fewer still would wish to emulate the sturdy plain-speaking of the "gudeman" in the Scottish ballad, who, when his witch-wife boasted how she bloomed into beauty after drinking the "wild-flower wine," replied, undauntedly,

"Ye lee, ye lee, ye ill womyn, Sae loud I hear ye lee; The ill-faured'st wife i' the kingdom of Fife Is comely compared wi' thee."

He could stand all the other marvels of the Sabbat, but that was too much for his credulity.

No doubt many of these Ugly Princesses are endowed with excellent sterling qualities. The old Border legend says there never was a happier match than that of "Muckle-mou'ed Meg," though her husband married her reluctantly with a halter tightening round his neck. But such advantages lie below the surface, and take some time in being appreciated. The first process of captivation is what I don't understand—unless, indeed, there are sparkles in the quartz, invisible to common eyes, that tell the experienced gold-seeker of a rich vein near.

Well, we will allow the proposition with which we started; but do you suppose its converse would hold equally good—that every woman could love once if she wished it? Nine out of ten of them would, I dare say, answer boldly in the affirmative; but in a few rather sad and weary faces you might read something more than a doubt about this; and lips, not so red and full as they once were, on which the wintry smile comes but rarely, could tell perhaps a different story. The precise mould that will fit some fancies is as hard to find as the slipper of Cendrillon; and so, in default of the fairy chaussure, the small white foot goes on its road unshod, and the stones and briers gall it cruelly.

With men it does not so much matter. They have always the counteracting resources of bodily and mental exertion, against which the affections can make but little head. Indeed, some of the most distinguished in arts, in arms, if not in song, seem to have gone down to their graves without ever giving themselves time to indulge in any one of these. Perhaps they never missed a sentiment which would have been very much in their way if they had felt it. If all tales are true, mathematics are a very effectual Nenuphar. But with women it is different. They can't be always clambering up unexplored peaks, or inventing improvements in gunnery, or commanding irregular corps, or bringing in faultless reform bills, or finding out constellations, or shooting big game, or resorting to any of our thousand-and-one safety-valves to superfluous excitement. Are crochet, or crossed letters, or charity-schools, or even Cochins and Creve-coeurs, so entirely engrossing as to drown forever the reproaches of nature, that will make herself heard? If not, surely the most phlegmatically proper of her sex does sometimes feel sad and dissatisfied when she thinks that she has never been able to care for any one more than for her own brother. It must seem hard that, when the frost of old age comes on, she shall not have even a memory to look upon to warm her. But in the world here, such temptations to discontent abound; but the most guileless votary of the Sacre Coeur might confess regrets and misgivings like these without meriting any extra allowance of fast and scourge.

If we were to reckon up the cases we have heard of women who have "gone wrong," and made, if not mesalliances, at least marriages inexplicable on any rational grounds, it would fill up a long summer's day, even without drawing on darker recollections of post-nuptial transgression. In these last cases, perhaps, the altar and absolute indifference was a more dangerous element than Mrs. Malaprop's "little aversion," which is, at all events, a positive, thing to work upon. Lethargies are harder to cure, they say, than fevers. Certainly they have the warning examples of others who have so erred, and paid for it by a life-long repentance; but that never has stopped them yet, and never will. Remember the reply of the debutante to her austere parent when the latter refused to take her to a ball, saying that "she had seen the folly of such things." "I want to see the folly of them too." Few of us men can realize the feeling that, with our sisters, may account for, though not excuse, much folly and sin. They see others happy all around them: it is hard to fast when so many are feasting. So there comes a shameful sense of ignorance—a vague, eager desire for knowledge—a terror of an isolation deepening and darkening upon them, and a determination, at any risks, to balk at least that enemy—and so, like the poor lady of Shalott, they grow restless, and reckless, and rebellious at last. They are safe where they are, but the days have so much of dull sameness that there is a sore temptation in the unknown peril. "Better," they say, "than the close atmosphere of the guarded castle and the phantasms of fairy-land, one draught of the fresh outer air—one glimpse of real life and nature—one taste of substantial joys and sorrows that shall wake all the pulses of womanhood, even though the experience be brief and dearly bought, though the web woven while we sat dreaming must surely be rent in twain—ay, even though the curse, too, may follow very swiftly, and the swans be waiting at the gate that shall bear us down to our burying."

If staid and cold-blooded virgins and matrons are not exempt from these disagreeable self-reproaches, how did it fare with Cecil Tresilyan, in whom the energy of a strong temperament was stirring like the spring-sap in a young oak-tree? Should she die conscious of the possession of such a wealth of love, with none to share or inherit it? She had seen such numbers of her friends and acquaintance "pair off," that she began to envy at last the facility of attachment that she had been wont to hold in scorn. Very many reflections of "lovers lately wed" had been cast upon her mirror, and yet the One knightly shadow was long in coming. Can it be that yonder gleam through the trees is the flash of his distant armor?

I hope this illustrated edition of rather an old theory has not bored you much; because it would have been just as simple to have said at once that, as the days went on in Dorade, and they were thrown constantly into each other's society, Major Keene began to monopolize much more of Cecil Tresilyan's thoughts than she would have allowed if she could have helped it; for, though she considered Mr. Fullarton's testimony unfairly biased by prejudice, she could not doubt that Royston was by no means the most eligible object to centre her young affections upon. He carefully avoided discussion or display of any of his peculiar opinions in her presence, and on such occasions seemed inclined to soften his habitually sardonic and depreciatory tone. Once or twice, when they did disagree, she observed that he contrived to make some one else take her side, and then argued the point, as long as he thought it worth while, with the last opponent. Beyond the courtesy which invariably marked his demeanor toward her sex, this was the only sign of especial deference that he had shown. She never could detect the faintest approach to the adulation that hundreds had paid her, and which she had wearied of long ago. Nevertheless, she knew perfectly that on many subjects, generally considered all-important, they differed as widely as the poles.

Perpetual struggles between the spirit and the flesh made Cecil's heart an odd sort of debatable land; if she could not always insure success and supremacy to the right side, she certainly did endeavor to preserve the balance of power. Personally she rather disliked Mr. Fullarton, but she seemed to look upon him as the embodiment of a principle, and the symbol of an abstraction. He represented there the Establishment which she had always been taught to venerate; and so she felt bound, as far as possible, to favor and support him; just as Goring and Wilmot, and many more wild cavaliers, fearing neither God nor devil, mingled in their war-cry church as well as king. (Rather a rough comparison to apply to a well-intentioned demoiselle of the nineteenth century, but, I fancy, a correct one.) Thus, if she indulged herself in a long tete-a-tete with Keene, she was sure to be extraordinarily civil to the chaplain soon after; and if she devoted herself for a whole evening to the society of the priest and his family, the soldier was likely to benefit by it on the morrow. Unluckily, the sacrifice of inclination was all on one side.

The antagonists had never, as yet, come into open collision. It was not respect or fear that made them shy of the conflict, but rather a feeling, which neither could have explained to himself, resembling that of leaders of parties in the House, who decline measuring their strength against each other on questions of minor importance, reserving themselves for the final crisis, when the want-of-confidence vote shall come on. Once only there was a chance of a skirmish—the merest affair of outposts.

Keene had been calling on the Tresilyans one evening, in the official capacity of bearer of a verbal message from Mrs. Molyneux. It was the simplest one imaginable; but as graver embassadors have done before him, liking his quarters he dallied over his mission. (If Geneva, instead of Paris, were chosen for the meeting of a Congress, would not several knotty points be decided much more speedily?) When, at last, all was settled, it seemed very natural that he should petition Cecil for "just one song;" and you know what that always comes to. Royston never would "turn over" if he could possibly avoid it; he considered it a willful waste of advantages, for the strain on his attention, slight as it might be, quite spoiled his appreciation of the melody. Perhaps he was right. As a rule, if one wanted to discover the one person about whose approval the fair cantatrice is most solicitous, it would be well to look not immediately behind her ivory shoulder. At all events, he had made his peace with Miss Tresilyan on this point long ago. So he drew his arm-chair up near the piano, but out of her sight as she sang, and sat watching her intently through his half-closed eyelids.

I marvel not that in so many legends of witchery and seduction since the Odyssey the [Greek: thespesie aoide] has borne its part. "But," the Wanderer might say, replying against Circe's warning, "have we not learned prudence and self-command from Athene, the chaste Tritonid? Have not ten years under shield before Troy, and a thousand leagues of seafaring, made our hearts as hard as our hands, and our ears deaf to the charms of song? Thus much of wisdom, at least, hath come with grizzled hair, that we may mock at temptations that might have won us when our cheeks were in their down. O most divinely fair of goddesses! have we not resisted your own enchantments? Shall we go forth scathless from AEaea to perish on the Isle of the Sirens?" But the low, green hills are already on the weather beam, and we are aware of a sweet weird chant that steals over the water like a living thing, and smooths the ripple where it passes. How fares it with our philosophic Laertiades? Those signs look strangely unlike incitements to greater speed; and what mean those struggles to get loose? Well, perhaps, for the hero that the good hemp holds firm, and that Peribates and Eurylochus spring up to strengthen his bonds; well, that the wax seals fast the ears of those sturdy old sea-dogs who stretch to their oars till Ocean grows hoary behind the blades; or nobler bones might soon be added to the myriads that lie bleaching in the meadow, half hidden by its flowers. It was not, then, so very trivial, the counsel that she gave in parting kindness—

[Greek: Kirke euplokamos, deine theos audeessa.]

Are we in our generation wiser than the "man of many wiles?" Dinner is over, and every one is going out into the pleasance, to listen to the nightingales.

"It will be delicious; there is nothing I should like so much; but I—I sprained my ankle in jumping that gate; and Amy" (that's "my cousin who happens to sing"), "I heard you cough three times this morning. You won't be so imprudent as to risk the night air? Ah! they are gone at last; and now, Amy dear—good, kindest Amy!—open the especial crimson book quickly, and give me first your own pet song, and then mine, and then 'The Three Fishers,' and then 'Maud,' and then, I suppose, they will be coming back again; but by that time, they may be as enthusiastic as they please, we shall be able to meet them fairly."

Things have changed since David's day; spirits are raised sometimes now, as well as laid, by harp and song. In good truth, they are not always evil ones.

On that night, Royston Keene listened to the sweet voice that seemed to knock at the gates of his heart—gates shut so long that the bars had rusted in their staples—not loudly or imperiously, but powerful in its plaintive appeal, like that of those one dearly loved, standing without in the bitter cold, and pleading—"Ah! let me in!" He listened till a pleasant, dreamy feeling of domesticity began to creep over him that he had never known before. He could realize, then, that there were circumstances under which a man might easily dispense with high play, and hard riding, and hard flirting (to give it a mild name), and hard drinking, and other excitements which habit had almost turned into necessities, without missing any one of them. There were two words which ought to have put all these fancies to flight, as the writing on the wall scattered the guests of Belshazzar—"Too Late." But he turned his head away, and would not read them. He had actually succeeded in ignoring another disenchanting reality—the presence of Mrs. Danvers. That estimable person seemed more than usually fidgetty, and disposed to make herself, as well as others, uncomfortable. There was evidently something on her mind from her glancing so often and so nervously at the door. It opened at last softly, just as Cecil had finished "The Swallow," and revealed Mr. Fullarton standing on the threshold. The latter was not well pleased with the scene before him. There was an air of comfort about it which, under the circumstances, he thought decidedly wrong; besides which he could not get rid of a vague misgiving (the rarest thing with him!) that his visit was scarcely welcome or well timed.

Miss Tresilyan rose instantly to greet the intruder (yes, that's the right word) with her usual calm courtesy. Very few words had been exchanged for the last hour, but she was perfectly aware—what woman is not?—of the influence she had exercised over her listener. That consciousness had made her strangely happy. So, she certainly could have survived the chaplain's absence. Royston Keene rose too, quite slowly. There are compounds, you know, that always remain soft and ductile in a certain temperature, but harden into stone at the first contact with the outer air. It was just so with him. Even as he moved, all gentle feelings were struck dead in his heart, and he stood up a harder man than ever, with no kinder emotion left than bitter anger at the interruption. He could not always command his eyes, he knew; and, if he had not passed his hand quickly over his face just then, their expression might have thrilled through the new-comer disagreeably.

"Cecil, dearest," Mrs. Danvers said, with rather an awkward assumption of being perfectly at her ease, "Mr. Fullarton was good enough to say he would come and read to us this evening, and explain some passages. I don't know why I forgot to tell you. I meant to do so, but—" Her look finished the sentence. Royston, like the others, guessed what she meant, and you may guess how he thanked her.

Cecil colored with vexation. She was so anxious to prevent Mrs. Danvers from feeling dependent that she allowed her to take all sorts of liberties, and the amiable woman was not disposed to let the privilege fall into disuse. On the present occasion there was such an absurd incongruity of time and place that she might possibly have tried to evade the "exposition," but she happened just then to meet Keene's eye. The sarcasm there was not so carefully veiled as it usually was in her presence. Never yet was born Tresilyan who blenched from a challenge; so she answered at once to express "her sense of Mr. Fullarton's kindness, and her regret that he had not come earlier in the evening." If Royston had known how bitterly she despised herself for disingenuousness he would have been amply avenged.

Even while she was speaking he closed the piano very slowly and softly. It did not take him long to put on his impenetrable face, for when he turned round there was not a trace of anger left; the scarce suppressed taunt in Cecil's last words moved him apparently no more than Mrs. Danvers's glance of triumph.

"I owe you a thousand apologies," he said, "for staying such an unwarrantable time, and quite as many thanks for the pleasantest two hours I have spent in Dorade. Don't think I would detain you one moment from Mr. Fullarton and your devotional exercises. You know—no, you don't know—the verse in the ballad:

'Amundeville may be lord by day, But the monk is lord by night; Nor wine nor wassail would stir a vassal To question that friar's right.'"

He went away then without another word beyond the ordinary adieu. Royston had a way of repeating poetry peculiar to himself—rather monotonous, perhaps, but effective from the depth and volume of his voice. You gained in rhythm what you lost in rhyme. The sound seemed to linger in their ears after he had closed the door.

As the echo of the firm, strong footstep died away, a virtuous indignation possessed the broad visage of the divine.

"It is like Major Keene," said he, "to select as his text-book the most godless work of the satanic school; but I should have thought that even he would have paused before venturing, in this presence, on a quotation from Don Juan."

At that awful word Mrs. Danvers gave a little shriek as if "a bee had stung her newly." Had she been a Catholic she would have crossed herself an indefinite number of times: will you be good enough to imagine her protracted look of holy horror? Cecil's eyes were glittering with scornful humor as she answered, very demurely, "What an advantage it is to be a large, general reader! It enables one to impart so much information. Now Bessie and I should never have guessed where those lines came from if you had not enlightened us. They seemed harmless enough in themselves, and Major Keene was considerate enough to leave us in our ignorance. So Byron comes within the scope of your studies, Mr. Fullarton. I thought you seldom indulged in such secular authors?" The chaplain was quite right in making his reply inaudible: it would have been difficult to find a perfectly satisfactory one. However, the hour was late enough to excuse his beginning the reading without farther delay. It was not a success. There was a stoppage somewhere in the current of his mellifluous eloquence; and the exposition was concluded so soon, and indeed abruptly, that Mrs. Danvers retired to rest with a feeling of disappointment and inanition, such as one may have experienced when, expecting a "sit-down" supper, we are obliged to content ourselves with a meagrely-furnished buffet. For some minutes after Mr. Fullarton had departed Miss Tresilyan sat silent, leaning her head upon her hand. At last she said, "Bessie, dear, you know I would not interfere with your comforts or your arrangements for the world; but, the next time you wish to have a repetition of this, would you be so very good as to tell me beforehand? I think I shall spend that evening with Fanny Molyneux. I do not quite like it, and I am sure it does me no real good."

She spoke so gently that Mrs. Danvers was going to attempt one of her querulous remonstrances, but she happened to look at the face of her patroness. It wore an expression not often seen there; but she was wise enough to interpret it aright, and to guess that she had gone far enough. It was ever a dangerous experiment to trifle with the Tresilyans when their brows were bent. So she launched into some of her affectionate platitudes and profuse excuses, and under cover of these retreated to her rest. It is a comfort to reflect that she slept very soundly, though she monopolized all the slumber that night that ought to have fallen to Cecil's share.

What did Royston Keene think of the events of the evening? As he went down the stairs I am afraid he cursed the chaplain once heartily, but on the whole he was not dissatisfied. At all events, the short walk down to the club completely restored his sang-froid, and the last trace of vexation vanished as he entered the card-room and saw the "light of battle" gleam on the haggard face of Armand de Chateaumesnil.



CHAPTER XI.

There was in Dorade a stout and meritorious elderly widow, who formed a sort of connecting link between the natives and the settlers. English by birth, she had married a Frenchman of fair family and fortune, so that her habits and sympathies attached themselves about equally to the two countries. You do not often find so good a specimen of the hybrid. She gave frequent little soirees, which were as pleasant and exciting as such assemblages of heterogeneous elements usually are—that is to say, very moderately so. The two streams flowed on in the same channel, without mingling or losing their characteristics. I fancy the fault was most on our side.

We no longer, perhaps, parade Europe with "pride in our port, defiance in our eye;" but still, in our travels, we lose no opportunity of maintaining and asserting our well-beloved dignity, which, if rather a myth and vestige of the past, at home, abroad, is a very stern reality. Have you not seen, at a crowded table d'hote, the British mother encompass her daughters with the double bulwark of herself and their staid governess on either flank, so as to avert the contamination which must otherwise have certainly ensued from the close proximity of a courteous white-bearded Graf, or a fringante vicomtesse whose eyes outshone her diamonds? May it ever remain so! Each nation has its vanity and its own peculiar glory, as it has its especial produce. O cotton mills of Manchester! envy not nor emulate the velvet looms of Genoa or Lyons; you are ten times as useful, and a hundredfold more remunerating. What matters it if Damascus guard jealously the secret of her fragrant clouded steel, when Sheffield can turn out efficient sword-blades at the rate of a thousand per hour? Suum cuique tribuito. Let others aspire to be popular: be it ours to remain irreproachably and unapproachably respectable.

So poor Mdme. de Verzenay's efforts to promote an entente cordiale were lamentably foiled. When the English mustered strong, they would immediately form themselves into a hollow square, the weakest in the centre, and so defy the assaults of the enemy. Now and then a daring Gaul would attempt the adventure of the Enchanted Castle, determined, if not to deliver the imprisoned maidens, at least to enliven their solitude. See how gayly and gallantly he starts, glancing a saucy adieu to Adolphe and Eugene, who admire his audacity, but augur ill for its success. Allons, je me risque. Montjoie St. Denis! France a la rescousse! He winds, as it were, the bugle at the gate, with a well-turned compliment or a brilliant bit of badinage. Slowly the jealous valves unclose; he stands within the magic precinct—an eerie silence all around. Suppose that one of the Seven condescends to parley with him; she does so nervously and under protest, glancing ever over her shoulder, as if she expected the austere Fairy momentarily to appear; while her companions sit without winking or moving, cowering together like a covey of birds when the hawk is circling over the turnip-field. How can you expect a man to make himself agreeable under such appalling circumstances? The heart of the adventurer sinks within him. Lo! there is a rustling of robes near; what if Calyba or Urganda were at hand? Fuyons! And the knight-errant retreats, with drooping crest and smirched armor—a melancholy contrast to the preux chevalier who went forth but now chanting his war-song, conquering and to conquer. The remarks of the discomfited one, after such a failure, were, I fear, the reverse of complimentary; and the unpleasant word begueule figured in them a great deal too often.

Cecil and Fanny Molyneux were certainly exceptions to the rule of unsociability, but the general dullness of those reunions infected them, and made the atmosphere oppressive; it required a vast amount of leaven to make such a large, heavy lump light or palatable. Besides, it is not pleasant to carry on a conversation with twenty or thirty people looking on and listening, as if it were some theatrical performance that they had paid money to see, and consequently had a right to criticise. The fair friends had held counsel together as to the expediency of gratifying others at a great expense to themselves on the present occasion, and had made their election—not to go.

Early the next morning Miss Tresilyan encountered Keene; their conversation was very brief; but, just as he was quitting her, the latter remarked, in a matter-of-course way, "We shall meet this evening at Madame de Verzenay's?"

She looked at him in some surprise, for she knew he must have heard from Mrs. Molyneux of their intention to absent themselves. She told him as much.

"Ah! last night she did not mean to go," replied Royston; "but she changed her mind this morning while I was with them. When I left them, ten minutes ago, there was a consultation going on with Harry as to what she should wear. I don't think it will last more than half an hour; and then she was coming to try to persuade you to keep her fickleness in countenance."

Now the one point upon which Cecil had been most severe on la mignonne was the way in which the latter suffered herself to be guided by her husband's friend. It is strange how prone is the unconverted and unmated feminine nature to instigate revolt against the Old Dominion—never more so than when the beautiful Carbonara feels that its shadow is creeping fast over the frontier of her own freedom. Nay, suppose the conquest achieved, and that they themselves are reduced to the veriest serfdom, none the less will they strive to goad other hereditary bondswomen into striking the blow. Is it not known that steady old "machiners," broken for years to double harness, will encourage and countenance their "flippant" progeny in kicking over the traces? How otherwise could the name of mother-in-law, on the stage and in divers domestic circles, have become a synonym for firebrand? Look at your wife's maid, for instance. She will spend two thirds of her wages and the product of many silk dresses ("scarcely soiled") in furnishing that objectionable and disreputable suitor of hers with funds for his extravagance. He has beggared two or three of her acquaintance already, under the same flimsy pretense of intended marriage, that scarcely deludes poor Abigail; she has sore misgivings as to her own fate. Alternately he bullies and cajoles, but all the while she knows that he is lying, deliberately and incessantly, yet she never remonstrates or complains. It is true that, if you pass the door of her little room late into the night, you will probably go to bed haunted by the sound of low, dreary weeping; but it would be worse than useless to argue with her about her folly; she cherishes her noisome and ill-favored weed as if it were the fairest of fragrant flowers, and will not be persuaded to throw it aside. Well, if you could listen to that same long-suffering and soft-hearted young female, in her place in the subterranean Upper House, when the conduct of "Master" (especially as regards Foreign Affairs) is being canvassed; the fluency and virulence of her anathemas would almost take your breath away. Even that dear old housekeeper—who nursed you, and loves you better than any of her own children—when she would suggest an excuse or denial of the alleged peccadilloes, is borne away and overwhelmed by the abusive torrent, and can at last only grumble her dissent. Very few women, of good birth and education, make confidantes nowadays of their personal attendants; and the race of "Miggs" is chiefly confined to the class in which Dickens has placed it, if it is not extinct utterly. But there is a season—while the brush passes lightly and lingeringly over the long trailing "back hair"—when a hint, an allusion, or an insinuation, cleverly placed, may go far toward fanning into flame the embers of matrimonial rebellion. I know no case where such serious consequences may be produced, with so little danger of implication to the prime mover of the discontent, except it be the system of the patriotic and intrepid Mazzini. Many outbreaks, perhaps—quelled after much loss on both sides, in which the monarchy was only saved by the judicious expenditure of much mitraille—might have been traced to the covert influence of that mild-eyed, melancholy cameriste.

Cecil, who was not exempt from these revolutionary tendencies, any more than from other weaknesses of her sex, was especially provoked by this fresh instance of Fanny's subordination.

"Mrs. Molyneux is perfectly at liberty to form her own plans," she said, very haughtily. "Beyond a certain point, I should no more dream of interfering with them than she would with mine. She is quite right to change her mind as often as she thinks proper, only in this instance I should have thought it was hardly worth while."

"Well," Keene answered, in his cool, slow way, "Mrs. Molyneux has got that unfortunate habit of consulting other people's wishes and convenience in preference to her own; it's very foolish and weak; but it is so confirmed, that I doubt even your being able to break her of it. This time I am sure you won't. It is a pity you are so determined on disappointing the public. I know of more than one person who has put off other engagements in anticipation of hearing you sing."

He was perfectly careless about provoking her now, or he would have been more cautious. That particular card was the very last in his hand to have played. Miss Tresilyan was good-nature itself in placing her talents at the service of any man, woman, or child who could appreciate them. She would go through half her repertoire to amuse a sick friend any day; neither was she averse to displaying them before the world in general at proper seasons, but she liked the "boards" to be worthy of the prima donna, and had no idea of "starring it in the provinces." All the pride of her race gathered on her brow just then, like a thunder-cloud, and her eyes flashed no summer lightning.

"Madame de Verzenay was wrong to advertise a performer who does not belong to her troupe. I hope the audience will be patient under their disappointment, and not break up the benches. If not, she must excuse herself as best she may. I have signed no engagement, so my conscience is clear. I certainly shall not go."

The bolt struck the granite fairly, but it did not shiver off one splinter, nor even leave a stain. Royston only remarked, "Then for to-day it is useless to say au revoir;" and so, raising his cap, passed on.

The poor mignonne had a very rough time of it soon afterward. Cecil was morally and physically incapable of scolding any one; but she was very severe on the sin of vacillation and yielding to unauthorized interference. The culprit did not attempt to justify herself; she only said, "They both wanted me to go so much, and I did not like to vex Harry." Then she began to coax and pet her monitress in the pretty, childish way which interfered so much with matronly dignity, till the latter was brought to think that she had been cruelly harsh and stern; at last she got so penitent that she offered to accompany her friend, and lend the light of her countenance to Madame de Verzenay. For this infirmity of purpose many female Dracos would have ordered her off to instant execution—very justly. That silly little Fanny only kissed her, and said, "She was a dear, kind darling." What can you expect of such irreclaimably weak-minded offenders? They ought to be sentenced to six months' hard labor, supervised by Miss Martineau; perhaps even this would not work a permanent cure. Still, on The Tresilyan's part, it was an immense effort of self-denial. She was well aware how she laid herself open to Royston Keene's satire, and how unlikely he was this time to spare her. Only perfect trust or perfect indifference can make one careless about giving such a chance to a known bitter tongue.

However, having made up her mind to the self-immolation, she proceeded to consider how best she should adorn herself for the sacrifice. Others have done so in sadder seriousness. Doubtless, Curtius rode at his last leap without a speck on his burnished mail: purple, and gold, and gems flamed all round Sardanapalus when he fired the holocaust in Nineveh: even that miserable, dastardly Nero was solicitous about the marble fragments that were to line his felon's grave. So it befell that, on this particular evening, Cecil went through a very careful toilet, though it was as simple as usual; for the ultra-gorgeous style she utterly eschewed. The lilac trimmings of her dress broke the dead white sufficiently, but not glaringly, with the subdued effect of color that you may see in a campanula. The coiffure was not decided on till several had been rejected. She chose at last a chaplet of those soft, silvery Venetian shells—such as her bridesmaids may have woven into the night of Amphitrite's hair when they crowned her Queen of the Mediterranean.

It was a very artistic picture. So Madame de Verzenay said, in the midst of a rather too rapturous greeting; so the Frenchmen thought, as a low murmur of admiration ran through their circle when she entered. Fanny, too, had her modest success. There were not wanting eyes that turned for a moment from the brilliant beauty of her companion to repose themselves on the sweet girlish face shaded by silky brown tresses, and on the perfect little figure floating so lightly and gracefully along amid its draperies of pale cloudy blue.

Miss Tresilyan felt that there might be one glance that it would be a trial to meet unconcernedly, and she had been schooling herself sedulously for the encounter. She might have spared herself some trouble; for Royston Keene was not there when they arrived. She knew that Mrs. Molyneux had told him of the change in their plans; but the latter did not choose to confess how she had been puzzled by the very peculiar smile with which the major greeted the intelligence: it was the only notice he took of it. So the evening went on, with nothing to raise it above the dead level of average soirees. Cecil delayed going to the piano till she was ashamed of making more excuses, and was obliged to "execute herself" with the best grace she could manage. Even while she was singing, her glance turned more than once toward the door; but the stalwart figure, beside which all others seemed dwarfed and insignificant, never showed itself. It was clear he was not among those who had given up other engagements to hear her songs. If we have been at some trouble and mental expense in getting ourselves into any one frame of mind—whether it be enthusiasm, or self-control, or fortitude, or heroism—it is an undeniable nuisance to find out suddenly that there is to be no scope for its exercise. Take a very practical instance. Here is Lieutenant Colonel Asahel ready on the ground, looking, as his conscience and his backers tell him, "as fine as a star, and fit to run for his life;" at the last moment his opponent pays forfeit. Just ascertain the sentiments of that gallant fusileer. Does the result at all recompense him for the futile privations and wasted asceticism of those long weary months of training—when pastry was, as it were, an abomination unto him—when his lips kept themselves undefiled from dryest Champagne or soundest claret—when he fled, fast as Cinderella, from the pleasantest company at the stroke of the midnight chimes? Of course he feels deeply injured, and would have forgiven the absentee far more easily if the latter had beaten him fairly, on his merits, breasting the handkerchief first by half a dozen yards.

On this principle, Miss Tresilyan labored all that evening under an impression that Keene had treated her very ill, and was prepared to resent it accordingly. Another there besides herself felt puzzled and uncomfortable. Harry Molyneux could not understand it at all. Royston had seemed so very anxious in the morning to induce Fanny to go—a proceeding which would probably involve the presence of her "inseparable;" and disinterested persuasion was by no means in the Cool Captain's line. So Harry went wandering about in a purposeless, disconsolate fashion for some time, till he found himself near Cecil. I fancy he had an indistinct idea that some apology was owing to her for his chief's unaccountable absence; at all events, he began to confide his misgivings on the subject as soon as the men who surrounded her moved away. They soon did so; for The Tresilyan had a way, quite peculiar to herself, of conveying to those whom she wished to get rid of that their audience was ended, without speaking one word. There was a very unusual element of impatient pettishness in her reply.