tainly appeared to be so, for Cosmo seemed to be bereft of all power of conversational initiative, and even in response he was sluggish and frozen. Miss Douglas, as the daughter of Lord Germistoune, a wealthy and well-known peer, was presumably of the London world; Cosmo himself was more or less of the same world, and that two such people should be together in a tête-à-tête, and be in want of topics of conversation, even for a minute, might well seem an unaccountable phenomenon. The mere routine work of each season produces, for a certain class of society, topics enough to supply with the materials of many hours' dialogue, the most brainless he or she who drifts through the regulation amount of duty or pleasure prescribed by the rubric of fashion. The veriest parrot, from the blessed iteration of the same phrases (if not ideas), heard hourly for three or four solid months, can scarcely fail to have glibly on the tip of his tongue sufficient smallchange of talk to pay his way without difficulty among the initiated. And then there are always one or two great salient events in the history of each season, which, independent of the smaller gossip, fend off from the talker the necessity of plunging, without a cork-jacket, into the hopeless waters of original ity. Let us cast back an eye over the last few seasons; at once it is struck by a dozen things of the sort. For instance, a royal savage-the blacker the better-visits the country, and reduces the nation to a state of infantile imbecility. In his honour there are court entertainments, where he is puzzled; and municipal banquets, where his inner man is compromised; a review at Windsor, where he is again puzzled; an exhibition of ironclads, where he is frightened and again sick. What a fund of topics in all

this! What possibilities of earnest question and response! Were you there? Were you? Had you the entrée to the privileged places? Did you see him? Is it true that he was sulky and rude? Can it be conceivable that his teeth chattered? Then the Duchess of -, in giving a fancy ball, supplies another fertile theme. It was beautiful, but she gave it too late or too early. It clashed with the festa of some other potentate. Such a pity! And was royalty really offended or not? If so, why?-if not, why not? Then the Prince's garden-party,-if you were at it, it is well; if not, still it is well, for much time can be consumed in giving every reason but the true one for your absence. The Academy has a sensation picture, painted by a girl blind from her birth. Here art-talk à discretion. She is equal to Salvator Rosa, or Horace Vernet, or Paul Potter, or any other painter-no matter whom-to whom the vox populi has taught you to liken her. There is a new reading of Hamlet by a Hindoo, which (in Hindustani) edifies society. Such a mellifluous language Hindustani! So perfect a vehicle for Shakespearian thought! Some curled darling of society cheats at cards or helps himself to his neighbour's wife. Here is breathless interest! breathless interest! Why did he do it? When? How? Where? What does Sir John say to it? Will the countess ever get over the shock? Moral - how people do such things? Some one else who ought to have known better commits some other faux pas, scarcely discussible, but which can be sniffed round with titillating innuendoes and low confidential murmurings. Burnand has a new farce, the scream of which has been loud enough to cross the Channel and be echoed in Paris. Doubtless you have heard it in both

can

SO

languages? Offenbach outdoes himself in a new opera-bouffe-'Suzanne et les Vieillards.' A little shocking, is it not? but then bright and clever! That atones for most things. And then comes the "music of the future," and sets the whole queer jumble to appropriate strains. You heard 'Lohengrin'? You did? It was a perfect enigma to you or entirely comprehensible. You sat through the whole of that first suffocating night? to the end? and wished for more? No wonder! Or wished yourself dead? How natural!

People who have these and a hundred kindred and equally welcome topics freely at command ought not to be in much danger of having to hazard an original thought, or of having to pause in an unbroken stream of well-worn but still serviceable platitudes. And then there is in reserve the gossip of "Prince's," "Hurlingham," and Cowes; the ordinary on dits about ordinary marriages, scandals, scrapes, flirtations, and what not. So that, altogether, there is surely more than enough, when the season is over, to carry one on from August till April-provided, of course, there is an occasional change in the scene of one's platitudinising. Cosmo, however, availed himself of none of these resources. He had entered the room, as we have seen, with ruffled plumage; but surely his good-breeding could not possibly permit him to sulk in a tête-à-tête with a lady who was doing her best to entertain him? No. Well, he was not sulky, but he was sombre; and that, with his natural shyness, had dammed up his ideas. Then, every moment he was with Miss Douglas deepened his impression of her wonderful resemblance to the Sasso-Ferrato Madonna, preoccupying him at first, and then making him feel-fancifully enough, to be

but

sure that ordinary topics of conversation were unsuitable in the presence of one about whom clung so many suggestions far removed from the banalité of common life. Miss Douglas, on her side, bravely struggled with difficulties; neither did she avail herself of the dreary reserve of London small-talk. She had in truth been but season-that of her debut-two years before, in town; so that her resources in that respect could neither have been many nor recent. Had it been otherwise, perhaps Cosmo's tongue would have been earlier untied, because Sasso Ferrato's Madonna would have ceased to embarrass him.

one

She and her father had been great travellers; for the old lord-being half invalid, half valetudinarianrequired perpetual change of scene, and frequent visits to those numerous health-resorts, scattered all over that large portion of Europe which is now included in the map of the invalid. In this way, there were few places in Europe of great interest which she had not visited; and a splendid collection of photographs, which lay on the table, comtained souvenirs of everything beautiful and noteworthy which she had herself seen. Upon this book, as an aid in her difficulty, she fell back; and, since Cosmo had also travelled much, she was able for a time, without seeming to lecture, to carry on a tolerably one-sided conversation.

Her manner was singularly unaffected and simple; and a certain freshness of appreciation made her remarks, on what she had really liked and admired, original and striking. By degrees Cosmo was thoroughly thawed; and catching the infection of an enthusiasm which was by no means foreign to his own nature, he began to exchange experiences and sentiments with her, with an carn

estness and volubility which, if they had suddenly broken forth from the iced man of half an hour ago, would have suggested magical transformation. But he, indeed, must have been of the earth earthy who could have recalled, in company with a sympathetic spirit, yet without some enthusiasm, the memories which this book awakened. For there was the Parthenon, shattered, despoiled, but peerless still in its beauty, and glorious in its suggestions of a panorama instinct with the genius of the Golden Age. And there were the Pyramids, from which even the tourist cannot hunt the mystery and awe of the early world. The Mount of Olives, where Reverence feels that in no language it dare utter its emotions. The Pincian Hill, where History seems to stagger under the burden of its records. The Golden Horn and the Golden Shell. The beautiful illusions of Stamboul, the wondrous realities of Syracuse, the weird resurrections of Pompeii, and the sunny life of Sorrento. From one to the other they passed, and through the quaint portals of many a rare old town of Germany and Holland, and by many a venerable monument of pious art, and up the castled Rhine, through the land of legendary lore, and on into the splendid wilderness of Alp and glacier. People who had beheld such scenes with seeing eyes-who had thought in them, felt in them, received some of their inspirations, and learned a few of their myriad lessons-and who had before them such aids to memory as this book contained, had assuredly small need to fall back for topics upon the dwarfed and dwarfing life of modern society. The photographbook proved an entirely successful stratagem of despair, which very soon changed into lively pleasure and interest, so that all sombre

clouds were dissipated. But the conversation was by no means all pitched in a transcendental or earnest key. It was constantly relieved by humorous reminiscences, which this or that scene recalled. Esmè proved to be full of fun; she was as eager and fresh in that respect as in more serious matters, and passed from one phase to the other with a certain quaint naïveté which ought to have been wholly captivating to Cosmo, had he not been a little doubtful as to the fitness of such characteristics in one who wore the outward semblance of his idealised Madonna. The time began to pass quickly -even too quickly.

At last there was but one more photograph to look at.

it

"There!" she said, as she turned over, "the last of my photographs, but to me the most beautiful-at least I am bound to say so; that is my home."

"It is beautiful," replied Cosmo, "and a capital photograph, for I know the place well. I can't be mistaken. It is Dunerlacht Castle?"

The

"Yes. I think it is very good; even papa is pleased with it. old part of the house comes out wonderfully; and the shadow on the water is so natural, is it not? And your travels have actually carried you up to our fastnesses ?" "Yes. I had to pass Dunerlacht pretty often a year or two ago. I had a shooting in-shire, not very far from you-Glenmoira."

"Oh, we know it very well! Some friends of ours used to have it. It is a charming little place. How lucky you were to have Glenmoira! How did you like it?" "I was delighted with it." "And you like Scotland?" "Yes; indeed, very much more than most other places."

"Now I am quite sure that you taste is admirable, although I don'

the least agree with you about Interlachen or the Giessbach."

"Are you as enthusiastic about Scotland as about Switzerland ?"

"Oh yes-more so; but it is a different kind of enthusiasm-just as I might be very enthusiastic about a friend, but still more so about papa, you know."

"Yes-the fatherland, of course, ought to be before all others; and, indeed, I suppose I ought to have the same sort of filial feeling to Scotland."

"What! are you a Scotchman ?" cried Esmè.

"Perhaps I should rather say of Scotch descent," replied Cosmo, with some embarrassment.

"Oh, your family have deserted the beloved country!-long ago?" "I-I-really don't quite know -some time-a generation or two, I believe."

Not to know the history and movements of one's ancestors for several hundred years struck Esmè as astonishing in one of gentle blood; but there was something in Cosmo's manner which told her that the subject was unpleasant to him, although he had himself introduced it, and so she abandoned it, merely asking him if he had given up his visits to Scotland as a sportsman.

"No," replied Cosmo, "not in theory, although in practice, since the year before last: but I am half thinking of going back this year; and, indeed, I have been in treaty for another moor-in a different county, however. But I scarcely think it will suit."

"I hear your friend talking about Scotland," said the old lord, who had by this time come to the end of his art-treasures; "and, by the by, who is your friend? His name puzzles me. It is Scotch, and it isn't Scotch. That is, it is the name of a locality, and the title

of a dormant Scotch peerage; but there is certainly no gentleman's family of that name in the country. Where does this gentleman come from?"

"Well, do you know, it is odd, but I can't tell you, except in a very hazy way. Cosmo and I were at Eton and a private tutor's together, and then at Cambridge, and we have been fast friends all our lives; but, as we used to say at school, I don't 'know him at home.""

"Ah! by the by, there is a Glencairn, the great capitalist and speculator. I know a good deal about bim-a rough, vulgar dog; but I believe he is unmarried. You don't know who your friend's father is."

"Well, I know one excellent trait in his father's character-he is immensely rich. I believe he made his fortune in the City; but he retired from business long ago (which is also to his credit), and lives in the wilds somewhere in the west of England. Glencairn has never asked me there, although I constantly go to his own shooting. I fancy his father is peculiar,-probably mad or something of the sort. He seldom speaks of him, although I know he goes to see him regularly. That's about all I know of the family. As to Glencairn's nationality, I never thought of that, except, of course, I supposed he was an Englishman; but he might have been a Kaffir by extraction, for anything he has ever said to me on the subject. He is rather reserved on some subjects, although the best fellow in the world when you know him, and immensely clever. His regiment used to swear by him, and a mess is generally not far wrong about a fellow's character."

"Oh! he was in the army?"
"Yes; he was a Captain in the
Dragoon Guards."

"He doesn't strike me as exactly

mess.

66

Ah, well, but he was.'

say ?" "Yes."

"Hum! I think I have heard that that regiment recruits its officers in the City very much."

"Oh no. There are some rich fellows in it of that sort; but City or not City, I don't know a better lot in the service. They used to be, at least, when Cosmo was in them."

"Well, I should have thought he was rather conceited and stiff to be a regimental favourite in a firstclass corps. Only my own impression-only my own first impression, You are not in the service?"

"No; I am a retired diplomatist," replied Tom, with a grin.

"Rather an early retreat, is it not?"

"Yes, perhaps but I wanted a career; and if a fellow wants a career, F.O. is not likely to give it him either at home or abroad."

"And so you left it?"
"And so I left it."
"And the career?"

"Ah! the career?-well, I begin to think a career is a mistake. I see fellows with careers not half so jolly as I am. There's Gerald St. Clair-now, there's an example. That fellow was always talking about it. He had career on the brain, I believe, and he put a lot of that sort of stuff into my head at Cambridge. 'You must have a horizon,' he used to say. Well, there he is in the House-has been in it for five years-and he has done nothing. On committees all day, and in his place all night, with lots to say, but never allowed to say it. I don't call that jolly. His time, he says, hasn't come. He must walk to his career over the dead bodies of a score or two of second

his foot in it. That's my idea."

"If every one thought as you do, we should be rather short of Ministers."

6

"Oh no; you can always get lots of middling seconds'-quite good enough for the business nowadays."

"Ha, ha! you take a low view of Ministerial qualifications. Perhaps you don't know that I have been in office myself?"

"Oh, of course I do. Who doesn't? But that was in the good times. Yet even you left it, though you had everything before yousomething like a career indeed.”

"Health, health," said the old gentleman, greatly delighted; he had once been, for six months, an under-secretary in an asthmatic coalition Government, which had been born moribund and expired within a year. "Health is a worse obstruction than a phalanx of prosy seniors. But then you had the Church or the bar, fairly unobstructed for a young fellow of talent and interest.

"No, I didn't fancy the bar, and I'm pretty sure the Church would not have fancied me-a case of mutual incompatibility, probably." "And so, " said Lord Germistoune, blending the elements of a yawn with a look of amusement— and so here you are."

"And so here I am; but I am certain I ought not to be here any longer--it is fearfully late. We are keeping you out of bed most unconscionably."

"Don't mention it-don't mention it. Ah! dear me, it is late. Well, I hope you'll come again and help me to kill an hour or two as pleasantly."

"Thanks. Can I be of any use