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wives get on very comfortably without any such
feeling. The Squire, for example, was a per-
fect husband, from an ordinary point of view
he surrounded Lady Eva with all possible luxu-
ries, and made her wish the law of his house-
hold; but of that intense sympathy, that actual
unity which is the marriage of the soul, he had
not the faintest conception. Now Eva was just
the woman to feel the want of this-to be vague-
ly conscious of something imperfect in the rela-
tion between herself and her husband, and at
the same time uncertain whether the fault was
his or her own. Thousands of women, wholly
commonplace, would have been perfectly happy
(in their sense of happiness) if they had occu-
pied Lady Eva's position. But she wanted
something more, which Rupert Redfern had not
got to give her.

Had she become the mother of children, she would have found a channel for the divine fountain of love and joy which was as yet "a fountain sealed." But this gift also was denied her. It is a situation of peril to a woman when she is thus unable to satisfy the chief longings of her nature. If one could analyze the history of many a sad and shameful breach of the marriage vows, there would usually be found an absolute incapacity for love, on one side or the other. After all the lessons of all the poets, it is amazing how few people have an accurate notion of what love means. Love is the only great motive-power in this world. Pseudo-philosophers, who desire to deal mathematically with humanity, should ponder this aphorism of mine.

it was clear from his expressive countenance that it contained matters of intense interest to him.

Vivian, meanwhile, took matters very easily. He was trying hard to get himself into a quiet state of mind. He was afraid of himself. He had brought himself down to a tolerably sober condition; but he was utterly uncertain whether this condition would be permanent. So he staid on at Broadoak Avon, and watched the progress of affairs, and waited to see whether he was getting sane. Still did he ride at irregular nocturnal hours, but he committed no robberies now. His habits were felicitously irregular. Sometimes he was up with the dawn, riding over the free moorland betwixt Broadoak and Riverdale; sometimes he lay in bed till long past luncheon, reading French novels and poetry, and smoking endless cigars. Little correspondence at this time had Vivian. Every day there was a Greek notelet from Earine-a little bit of fresh loving talk, that seemed like a frond of maiden-hair or a bloom of cyclamen. Every day did Vivian grow more and more in love with this simple and beautiful child of the Egean. Alas! every day did he feel more keenly his own unfitness for marriage.

Vivian was rather surprised to find that Madame de Petigny Garnuchot was an early riser. He did not expect it of her. He regarded her as belonging to that large class of Frenchwomen who want a cup of chocolate in bed before they can encounter the duties of the day. Suddenly it flashed upon him that Madame came down just in time to meet the postman-a functionary in whom Vivian had slight interest, since he knew that he should always get his notelet from Earine, and also knew that no

that Madame invariably met the postman, invariably also appeared in the hall just as the letters to be sent out were placed on a slab of white marble. A kind of instinct brought him to the belief that Madame (of whom he had doubts from the first) was simply a clever mouchard. He resolved to find her out.

So, as I have said, Lady Eva was cheered and enlivened by the companionship of Madame de Petigny Garnuchot, who was emphatically bon camarade. Madame's liveliness was inexhaust-body else knew his address. But he discovered ible. Every thing appeared to interest her. Her keen dark eyes noticed every thing, indoors and out; her comments were always appropriate, often witty. She sat like a happy spectator in the stalls of the great theatre of human affairs. Enviable temperament! It is the only theatre to which one has a perpetual free admission, and yet how few of us profit by Clearly, if espionage was her duty, Achille the privilege! There is more real drama in a Catelan was the person to be watched. bee-hive or an ant's nest in an hour than in all gay wit and caustic irony of his political writthe theatres of London right through the sea-ings had long ago aroused imperial hatred. He son; and thrush and nightingale and lark are far finer minstrels than Tietjens and Goethe; and the hawk that flies at the hernshaw, or the pigeon that tumbles in the sapphire air, is more marvellous to look upon than Blondin on his rope or Leotard on his trapèze.

M. Achille Catelan spent the greater portion of his time in Squire Redfern's library-a great collection, with many rare and recondite volumes in it. Bibliomania had infected some of the Squire's ancestors. M. Catelan was wont to spend long mornings in the library, and, after luncheon, to walk for an hour or so in the grounds, and then to return to his reading. But he wrote and received many letters; and when at breakfast he perused his correspondence,

The

had the art of evoking a despot's detestation with exquisite ease; a master of epigram and allusion, he was more than a match for the master of many legions and much artillery. The world, you see, has its compensations. And M. Catelan, as I have said, was also a conspirator. The enemies of Cæsarism, in all countries, were his intimate friends. He was in constant correspondence with them all, and knew their plans, and was their confidential counsellor.

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in a neighboring village; Vivian summoned him | from him by some simple device. The dull to his assistance.

So it happened that one afternoon, as Madame de Petigny Garnuchot was walking in the grounds, she was accosted by a laboring man, who said

rustic got a small sum in silver from both parties, and was thoroughly content, and did nothing but drink drugged beer and smoke bad tobacco for the next two days.

Madame de Petigny Garnuchot, having, with

"Asking your pardon, miss, can you tell me a Frenchwoman's quickness, made mental memwhere to take this letter?" oranda of what the intercepted note contained, And he took from his pocket a large red cot-retired to her own apartment to write. ton handkerchief, which, being unrolled, there appeared a brown paper parcel. This again being carefully unwrapped, he produced a letter addressed to M. Achille Catclan.

Madame Garnuchot jumped at this, with a greediness in her eyes.

Vivian, who began to find the affair as amusing as hunting an otter or drawing a badger, was resolved to beat her at her own weapons.

As I have said, Madame used generally to be in the hall just as the letters were collected for the postman. Now the manner of dealing with

"I know the person to whom it is address- correspondence at Broadoak Avon was this. ed," she said. "I will give it him."

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"He is not at home now," said Madame, lying fearlessly. "I will take care that he has it the moment he returns."

And she gave the messenger half a crown, to silence his objections.

People sent their letters down into the hall,

Asking your pardon, miss, I was ordered to where they lay upon a marble side - table. give it into the gentleman's own hands." When the postman called, a servant collected them and handed them over to him. A careless fashion, but characteristic of Squire Redfern, who always trusted the people about him. My own experience is that, now that every body can read, letters are perpetually tampered with. The sacrosanctity of a letter is not intelligible to people beneath a certain rank of life; men-servants and maid-servants, fed upon penny periodicals, have a romantic inquisitiveness, and love to find out the affairs of their masters and mistresses. Thackeray was never weary of reminding us that all our private affairs, our nice little family quarrels, our unpaid bills, our small secrets of all kinds, are the talk of the servants' hall, and furnish pleasant excitement for that domestic circle.

"Now," she said to herself, almost aloud, walking rapidly along a turfen terrace towards a retired part of the gardens, "now I hope I have caught him."

There was an arbor at the end of this terrace. Madame sat down therein, somewhat out of breath. After a moment's pause, she opened the letter, wholly unaware that Vivian was watching her.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE POSTMAN ARRIVES. "How now! a rat? Dead, for a ducat, dead!" VIVIAN SAW Madame de Petigny Garnuchot open this letter addressed to Achille Catelan, saw her read it with eager eyes, watched her as she walked rapidly back to the house. It was an absurd bit of composition, of his own doing. It informed Catelan of an immediate outbreak which was to occur at Paris, and invited him to come over in good time to take part in the arrangements, mentioning in a mysterious fashion men whom he was to meet, and where he was to meet them. Some he was to see in London, some in Paris. The vraisemblance of the thing was perfect.

Having intercepted it, the difficulty for her was to pass it on again, seeing that she had interfered with the proper method of delivery. After some deliberation, she concluded that the best plan was to find a rustic messenger, and send it by him.

"Master's had another tiff with missus," says John Thomas.

"Yes, and I know why," says Abigail. "It's all along of young Mr. William. He's got into a lot of debt again, and master swears he won't pay it, and missus has been crying dreadful."

"You know nothing about it," exclaims a pert fille de chambre. "I could tell you if I chose. Jt was all Miss Constance and that Captain Stuart that she's so fond of. She declares she shall die if she mayn't marry him; and her mamma takes her part, and master says he won't have him come near the house."

This is the sort of thing which you might hear if you were in receipt of fernseed, and could walk invisible into your servants' hall. Servants know every thing. You can not expect them to be uninterested in the drama of life which you are acting for their amusement. And, if you leave letters within their reach, depend on it they will be read.

Just before the postman was due that evening, Vivian walked into the hall, smoking a Those who have lived in the country are well cigar, with his hands in the pockets of his aware that dull rustics are not difficult to find. lounging-coat. A lamp stood on the sideMadame Garnuchot found one easily enough, table, and beside it was a heap of letters-mostand gave him careful direction, not unwatched ly the Squire's big square missives, directed in by Vivian all the while. And of course Vivian, a hand that you could read a couple of yards knowing that his letter, if it reached Catelan, off. There were one or two of Lady Eva's delwould be detected as a hoax, took excellent icate fragrant notes, one or two also of Achille care to intercept Madame's rustic, and get it Catelan's, written in the quaintest of hands

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Eton boy, and played female characters in Eton theatricals; and when that development is possible, there is no saying what may happen. Praed himself might have lived to balk the ambition of a Smith, and to edit the "Quarterly."

There is no Eton for girls, and ladies' colleges are an abomination; and if a girl is left without education, she probably "cometh up as a flow

The servant went, and just at the same instant Madame de Petigny Garnuchot came deli-er," and delighteth the hearts of publishers. cately tripping down the great stone staircase, dressed in black, with white lace at her throat and wrists, carrying in her hand a couple of letShe hesitated a moment when she saw Vivian and his dogs: then she came forward to the table.

ters.

66

"Yes," answered Vivian.

gar, Madame.

"Forgive my ciI have sent Johnson to look for

a letter of mine."

But it can not be denied that in the present day young women are a very sad sequitur to little girls. One nuisance is that little girls become young women so confoundedly early: a small person of thirteen or so stands on her dignity, and disdains to romp, and thinks her

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"I am just in time for the post," she said, self quite grown up." If, however, you can putting down her letters. find a girl who is girlish-a real child, without any silly notion about being a young lady-she is a very delightful creature: but this state of things is as evanescent as a sunset, and the next time you see her she will probably have become the primmest little prig in the world, with definite theories of her own concerning society and fashion and theology.

"Oh, you know I never care about the smoke of cigars. I like it. I like a little cigarette myself sometimes."

As she spoke she was standing close to the table, and looking eagerly, so Vivian thought, at the addresses of M. Catelan's letters.

"She is a mouchard, I'll swear," said Vivian to himself.

All this is due, in a measure, to cheap literature. The penny papers have revolutionized the world. They educate us all, whether we like it or not. They teach the veriest infant Suddenly there was a scamper of feet, a that their father and mother are fallible creabarking of dogs. There was a rat in the hall, tures, by no means to be reverenced. Indeed and the two terriers were after him at once. the whole duty of man in these times may be Hot foot, helter-skelter, dogs and rat were tum- described as reverence to himself, and irreverbling over each other. Madame screamed, gath-ence to every body else. "Know thyself" is ered up her petticoats, ran up the staircase with an absurd old maxim: the thing can't be done : a display of dainty ankles. As the rat was why try? Believe in thyself, oh man, and on no killed, the postman rang, and Johnson, with Viv-account believe in any body else. ian's letter in his hand, opened the hall-door. Vivian took Madame Garnuchot's letters to Vivian gathered up the letters from the table, and handed them to the servant. Some of them, at least. I fear Madame's correspondence found its way to the very coat-pocket which had previously contained the rat that caused the diversion.

Satisfied with his little ruse, Vivian went to dress for dinner. He kept Madame Garnuchot's letters, to amuse him when he went to bed.

CHAPTER XVII.

BOYS AND GIRLS.

"I wish that I could run away
From House and Court and Levée,
Where bearded men appear to-day
Just Eton boys grown heavy."

Ir was from Charles Lamb that Praed borrowed this touch of levity. For my own part, I think it is an insult to the Eton boys. If the House of Commons and the saloons of Royalty were filled with men at all like Etonians grown heavy," it would be a measureless reform. A man who has been gay and joyous and brilliant in his boyhood can by no process subside into the average dunderhead of the day. It is a fact, though, that Beales, M.A., was an

66

his room in the evening, and read them at his leisure. One was addressed to an official person at Paris whose name was well known to him as connected with imperial espionage; the other was to a crony of the writer's at Rouen, and was full of argot only readable by a person singularly well acquainted with French society of the Bohemian order. The former of these letters merely repeated, so far as she could understand it, the subject of that epistolary hoax which Madame had intercepted; but the other was a vivid picture of Madame's life at Broadoak Avon, with keen unflattering portraits of the persons whom she saw, Vivian himself being a prominent figure. It was a piquant piece of gossip, such as none but a very clever Frenchwoman could write; with a vein of vulgarity running through it which Madame never betrayed in conversation.

Its contents surprised Vivian. He read it through twice with considerable interest; then, instead of going to bed as he had intended, he dressed in a riding costume, went down to the stables, saddled his bay mare, and rode off in the moonlight.

His absence was not noticed till the afternoon of the next day, since he very frequently did not appear till dinner-time. He had left a note for Eva, to say that he might be away for

a day or two. Madame de Petigny Garnuchot | had not yet regained its balance, and that he seemed to take curious interest in his disappearance.

"Monsieur votre cousin is rather eccentric, apparently," she said to Lady Eva.

"He does pretty much as he likes," was the reply. "It is the way with Englishmen who have no particular duties or dependents."

"He is very charming and very clever," said Madame. "What a pity he does not range himself, and marry. He is rich, of course?"

"He is pretty well off, but he is not what we call a marrying man. He likes independence too much."

"Ah, but if all clever and handsome men were like that, what would the ladies do? I think gentlemen like Monsieur Vivian ought to be obliged to marry."

Lady Eva, not entirely agreeing in this view of the matter, replied with a remark on the beauty of the afternoon, and so the subject dropped.

Vivian, as I heretofore said, started for his ride through the moonlight. He travelled for some hours, and soon after daybreak reached the Peacock inn. They were early folk at that hostelry, all but the landlord. Old Polly could

never sleep beyond five o'clock; and when she was up and stirring, the servant-maids had to be on the move, and the whole huge inn was awake long before ordinary hours.

had been doing a little somnambulism. As to the clasp-knife, it might easily have been left in the room by some rustic employed on the premises.

Thus having decided, Vivian tried to find in his bath the refreshment which he had not obtained from sleep. Ah, but there is nothing like sleep. I am φίλυπνος, φίλυμνος. Who loves song, loves sleep. And sleep I love because it seems to me like a fragment of the unknown future. It brings me a cup of the water of eternity. I drink Lethe. All the fret and fever of the world-all the biting arrows of mine enemies, and the interminable dreariness of my friends-what are they to me. . . who sleep? "It wraps a man round like a cloak," quoth Sancho Panza. Aye, a cloak invulnerable to all poisonous javelins which our fates and foes and friends jaculate at us. Give me, as Sir Philip Sydney wished,

"A chamber deaf to noise, and blind to light,"

and I will utterly forget the troubles of the garish day, and sink into dreamless slumber, as I hope in time to sink into that sweeter sounder sleep which we call death. Then write upon my headstone

"After life's fitful fever he sleeps well."

Aye, but the morning! Open the window! Comes through the casement the fresh breath of dawn-and therewith the song of joyous birds, the delicious fragrance of flowers, the unutterHav-able delight of the young day. This is the new world; this is Morning Land; this is a region untrodden hitherto by mortal foot. Every day the world is created anew. The man who does

Hence did it happen that our wayfarer found hostlers ready to take charge of his mare. ing seen her safe, he entered the inn-found his old friend-and was shown to the chamber in which he previously had slept.

"Let me sleep four hours," he said, "and not know this is a mere dolt. then I'll breakfast."

Yes, every day there is a new world. And I regret to say that he did not get a fair four if this be so, as it certainly is, every day of our hours' sleep. Was he dreaming or awake? experience-if the sleep that comes to us with He could not tell; but that terrible old hag in every revolution of the planet whereon we dwell the picture, with wild gray locks and marvel-brings a new heaven and a new earth on our lous maddened eyes, stood over him with a dag-own awakening-how will it be with that greatger in her hand, and he felt its keen point on er, longer sleep which terminates (so far as we his breast. He struggled-she was stronger than he dreamt a woman could be--he caught her by the throat at length, and she gave one wild scream, and fell back upon the floor with a frightful crash.

Vivian was awake now, at any rate. Broad daylight poured through the windows. He still felt the dagger of his dream; and, looking down at his breast, he saw a slight stain of blood on his shirt. This was accounted for by a wound, scarcely more than skin deep, in his breast. He looked round for the weapon. It lay on the floor by his bedside—a very unromantic article -a common clasp-knife.

"Well," he reflected, "if I was a respectable old female ghost, and wanted to assassinate a fellow I didn't know, I'd certainly use a more elegant weapon."

What was he to conclude about this curious incident? He came to a rapid and distinct conclusion. It was simply this: that his brain

know) our dwelling on this planet? What will the new morning be after that deep, dreamless sleep? What manner of birds will sing, and flowers breathe odor, and light fall upon the scene in the new world thus entered? They will transcend all our earthly experience. If it be delicious to welcome the summer morning after our ordinary sleep, how infinitely delicious will it be to encounter the unknown, unguessable morning whereto we shall awaken from the sleep which men call death! I often wonder that men are not eager to sink into that sleep, that they may wake to the light of a loftier dawn.

Vivian came down to breakfast; had a chat with Pinnell; learnt that Eastlake was at home, and started for Birklands. He arrived at that pleasant mansion early in the summer afternoon. There was a misty light mingled with the sunshine, and the great elms in the Park hid their leafy summits in the veil of vapor.

As he rode towards the house, he perceived that | teen-who filled the table. Cold duck, fowl, something was going on: round by the stables lamb, the pies of Perigord, cool cucumbers, huge a line of carriages was drawn up, their shafts salads of lobster, crowded the board; ample conturning skywards; and on the lawn he saw fectionery was there, and ices beyond counting; many gay groups of children, with comparative- aye, and a limited supply for the seniors of pale ly few grown-up folk among them. ale and claret-cup.

"Jack's got a child's party," thought Vivian. "Dear old boy! He's an elderly child himself."

"The old buffer is confoundedly stingy with his beer," remarked Sir Charles Heyford, a baronet of fourteen, whose father died in his babyLeaving his mare in good hands, he walked hood, and whose mother, being a lady of fashion, forward to the lawn. It was a joyous scene. had left him to study beer and tobacco, horses Multitudinous young folk of both sexes were and dogs, in the stables of Heyford Manor. taking pleasure in various ways: in one place The boy had not neglected the curriculum, and was cricket, and in another croquet; there was could drink, smoke, ride, shoot, and swear a velocipede race along a gravel walk; there against any groom or gamekeeper in the counwere little people flying into the air in swings; try. Yet there was the making of a fine fellow there was a man busily engaged in filling bal-in him. loons, which rose one after the other into the quiet ether; a Punch and Judy show was amusing a changeful crowd; boats were moving on the pond which Jack called his lake; a series of donkeys were doing their utmost to upset their riders; and the music of a German band was torturing the air. Vivian looked on delightedly, and reflected on the odious necessity that boys and girls should grow into men and women. Not being in any haste to find his friends, he established himself on a rustic seat, and lighted a cigar and enjoyed the spectacle. The soft south wind, laden with a myriad odors from the summer gardens, passed gayly by him, and tossed about the tresses and draperies of the merry maidens on the lawn.

Vivian, having had a long ride, was rather peckish; so he glided into a seat at the very bottom of the table, and contrived to get some cold meat and beer. His next neighbor, a little girl nine or ten years of age, began to chatter to him as soon as he sat down. She was a child with a marvellous thick mass of that red hair which delights painters, and which other human beings abhor-a weird' child, rather. She began by asking Vivian who he was, and where he came from: he promptly replied that he was the Old Man of the Sea, and had come to stretch his legs after his long ride on Sindbad the Sailor's shoulders.

"But the Old Man of the Sea ought to have gray hair," was the response.

"Yes, I saw a mermaid once. It was in Wales, on the sea, by moonlight. We were in a boat, and saw her quite clearly, sitting on a rock, and heard her sing, so strangely. As we got near her, she glided into the water."

Suddenly the games were suspended, the "No: it's only old men of the land that do cricketers threw down their bats, and the cro-that. There's a great difference, you know. queters their mallets; Punch and Judy beheld Maidens who live on land have legs, but mertheir audience rapidly disappearing in the dis- maidens have tails." tance, and made remarks each to the other on the neglect of the classic drama; the donkeys lost their riders, and went off to browse on Jack Eastlake's flower-beds; and there was a rapid skedaddle of small legs all in one direction. Looking that way, Vivian beheld a tent-and the meaning of the movement flashed upon him. "Eating and drinking,' he soliloquized. "Those are real solid sterling pleasures, compatible with innocence. Once I loved jam tarts and ginger-beer; now I care very little indeed for red deer venison and Clos Vougeot. Deer's flesh is easy to digest, and good Burgundy goes straight to the blood, and so I like them. But I think a world in which eating and drinking were not necessary would be an agreeable improvement on this present planet."

Having delivered himself of this sublime reflection, Vivian strolled in a leisurely fashion towards the tent, and looked quietly through one of its entries.

"Ah," said Vivian, encouraging the superstitious little girl to talk as she pleased, “you should hear the sirens sing. They beat all your mermaids."

"I've read about them," she replied gravely. "I thought if you heard them you could never get away, and they put you to death in some dreadful manner. Have you heard them ?" "Oh yes," said Vivian, "several times." "Then how did you get away?"

"I don't care so much about music as some people."

From this topic the conversation between Vivian and his young friend strayed to others of kindred nature. She seemed to have no mental food except of this romantic sort. She was credulous of all preternatural fictions. She believed in ghosts and fairies, in gnomes and doppelgangers, in Undine and Peter Schlemihl. Vivian found her an amusing companion at luncheon, but could not help wondering where and how she got her education.

At the head of a long table was Jack Eastlake, "as jolly as a sandboy," slashing away mercilessly at a cold baron of beef. Clara and Earine sat on each side of him, and to Vivian it appeared that the beautiful child of Greece looked a trifle melancholy amid the mirth. Footmen were busy in attending to the wants of the Even where children are the guests, a cold young people-of ages varying from six to six-collation can not last forever; exhaustion of

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