tom" There he stopped, appalled by

the brutality of the phrase.

"I cannot believe it," she said slowly to herself. "I never dreamt you were

He might have answered that, had she not laid his former life in ruins, he never would have been this kind of man. But even the thought was far from him. He only waited for her to speak, and then, as she palpably could not, he went on:

"Perhaps conventionalities signify as little to you as they do to me. They are not important to me now, if they stand in the way of something greater. Perhaps you would be willing to come to me as soon as possible. Then, if we were under the same roof, you would feel safe.

Her eyes still dwelt upon his face, incredulously, yet with a struggling joy. She bent forward, and thrilled him with a whisper :

"Is it do you love me?" She waited for her answer. In that instant, what thronging memories beset him! Love! He saw it in the roseate apotheosis of youth, announced by chiming bells, crowned with unfading flowers, the minister to bliss. He followed it through stony paths marked by other blood-stained tracks up to the barren peaks of pain. Was it the same creature, after all, rose lipped or passion - pale, starving with loss or drunken on new wine? Was it the love of one soul accompanying him through all, or was this his response to the individual need, and only a part of the general faithfulness to what demands our faith? He was not silent long enough to bring her to confusion, and yet it seemed to him an age of retrospect. He recalled himself. "Mildred," he said gently, with a compliance so exquisite as to seem like love itself, "I don't know how to define things. I stopped a good while ago. It is n't possible, when you have much to do with life. But whatever happiness I am capable of would result from your coming to me."

would accept things."

"Ah!" she breathed quickly. This was the first gleam of hope in all her darkening lot. But through her gains and losses she had kept some accountability to the world. "It would seem," she began -"people would say Then a scarlet shame beset her. She remembered who had betrayed their common life to vulgar tongues.

The doctor took her speech precisely at its face value. That was easy, for he had left himself outside the question. Life had resolved itself into a hurried progress, wherein his only duty was to act. There was no time, between this and death, even to listen for the world's dull verdict.

"It is true," he said. "The memory of the dead must be respected; but extraordinary cases demand like remedies. When you consider that his one thought, through his illness, was to save you pain, you can imagine that your safety would give him more pleasure than anything else."

But she was not thinking of the other man. Her mind had wandered, woman fashion, to the past, piecing it, with unreasoning precision, to the living hour. St. John was beginning here.

"I don't want to urge it unduly," he continued, "but it is only fair to tell you

that you would have a sheltered life, a free one. I should wish to be regarded as your friend, one who would make no demands on you."

She seemed to suffer under a secret sting. Perhaps, without even sketching for herself the outlines of that most thrilling dream, she craved the urgency of love as it is in youth, eager and uncontrolled. Even his kindliness left her a woman scorned; but the next words, though spoken awkwardly, disarmed her. "I should be," he said, "your debtor - always. I need n't say that."

"Robert," she whispered, with sudden passion, "when did you forgive me? You have forgiven me? Then - at once or lately?"

THE part of Darwin's exposition of his theory of the origin of species which has most given me question is that in which he deals with the relation of beauty to the evolution of a more perfectly from a less perfectly organized and individualized life, and denies the reality of beauty independent of individual tastes. With out in the least dissenting from Darwin's general thesis or questioning his accuracy of observation, I shall venture to point out that, in respect to the relation of beauty and design in creation, his philosophy has not kept pace with his scientific acumen. Some of his most faithful and eminent disciples, as, for instance, Professor Asa Gray and the Duke of Argyll, have recognized an hiatus in the demonstration, which they have been compelled to fill by the hypothesis of creative design,

an hypothesis which Darwin neither supported nor denied, while his expressed approbation of Gray's teleology shows that it was not repugnant to him or inconsistent with his conclusions.

When, therefore, Darwin says "the sense of beauty obviously depends on the nature of the mind, irrespective of any real quality in the admired object; and the idea of what is beautiful is not innate or unalterable. We see this, for instance, in the men of different races admiring an entirely different standard of beauty in their women,' he states the problem incompletely; for the only logical conclusion of such a statement would be that no one object is more beautiful than another. No person of a taste however perverted will admit this, and the collective experience of the world disproves it. For although one individual taste may differ from another in the priority it may give to one or another element of beauty, there is no man, and (if we may accept the conclusion of Darwin himself as to the effect of beautiful plumage on sexual attraction with birds) there are few animals, on whom the aesthetic sense has not 1 The Origin of Species, chap. vi.

a certain power. The care of the bower bird to decorate the nest shows that to him, at least, the "idea of what is beautiful is innate," ,"1 if not unalterable, and that beauty is to a certain extent the probable basis of sexual attraction. It would seem that he has the consciousness of its force, though in the case of the beauty of his plumage the male bird may be absolutely unconscious of its efficiency.

Now, the question of the actuality of a sense of beauty, or, as it is commonly called at present, with a wider meaning than the visual appeal, the "æsthetic faculty," is here shown to be quite separate from that of the existence or nonexistence of an "ideal" or special and invariable type of beauty; 2 but the investigation in either case is one which escapes entirely the scientific faculties, properly speaking, and comes within the exclusive cognizance of the philosophic; and a considerable personal acquaintance with scientists enables me to assert with confidence that the high development of the scientific faculties excludes the development of the aesthetic, as the analytic excludes the synthetic. I never knew a specialist in physical science who possessed in an eminent degree a taste in art or feeling for it, as distinguished from the representation of nature, which is an entirely different thing; and the expert opinion in the question of the nature and existence of an ideal is not to be expected from the physicist, but from the artist and the art critic. Like evolution, the ideal cannot be demonstrated, but must rest on the basis of the highest probability. In the one case, however, the expert and weighty opinion is that of the physicist; in the other, that of the artist and art student, Darwin or Ruskin, Aristotle or Plato. Darwin's position, quoted above, logically leads to the

1 It may be said, in passing, that this development of the æsthetic sense in the bird is a conclusive proof that it is pure instinct, and therefore not due to any mental association or education.

That Darwin had never given the subject the necessary consideration is shown by the following statement, -a confutation of an hypothetical assumption which I for one am not prepared to maintain: "If beautiful objects had been created solely for man's gratifica tion, it ought to be shown that before man appeared there was less beauty on the face of the earth than since he came on the stage." If any one had put forward such a theory, Darwin's reply is insufficient. If beautiful objects had "been created solely for man's gratification," as they preceded him in the scheme of creation, they would have been prepared for him before his appearance on the earth, and the hypothetical deliberation of the Creator to create them for him would have comprehended the anticipation of his coming, and therefore all the beauty must have been on the face of the earth before he came on the stage." It is like saying that a house could not have been so comfortable before the tenant took possession, because he was not there to enjoy the comfort. Yet a little further on Darwin says: "On the other hand, I willingly admit that a great number of male animals, as all our most gorgeous birds, some fishes, reptiles, and mammals, and a host of magnificently colored butterflies, have been rendered

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2 The aesthetic sense as developed in art responds to two distinct appeals, — that of a decorative character and that of embodiment of the ideal. Art begins with the former, and ends with the latter.

beautiful for beauty's sake; but this has been effected through sexual selection, that is, by the more beautiful males having been continually preferred by the females, and not for the delight of man.' But if "the sense of beauty obviously depends on the nature of the mind, irrespective of any real quality in the admired object, and the idea of what is beautiful is not innate or unalterable," how can the female, even in the lower orders of creation, have "continually preferred" the same qualities in the appearance of the males? Is not this admission tantamount to the further admission that for each species of animal at least the idea of what is beautiful is innate and unalterable? If the idea of beauty be not innate, how do the lower animals, to whom education is impossible, attain to it? And if it be not unalterable, how shall the same characteristics of beauty continue to augment until they become the dominant and distinguishing marks of the species?. It would seem that each species of animals has its distinct ideal of the beautiful; otherwise, the male of the goldfinch might be the most attractive to the female of the greenfinch; and the variations in coloration, instead of being as we see them, always in the direction of the intensification of the same scheme of coloration, might be expected to vary, and add the charms of novelty to those of color. But the assumption by Darwin, that the idea of beauty is not innate or unalterable is proved by the fact of “the men of different races admiring an entirely different standard of beauty in their women," is premature. We have no information on which to base any conclusions as to the ideal of beauty in the undeveloped races of mankind, but we have the right to conclude that with a low intellectual and social condition the æsthetic sense could never be so far developed as to constitute a primary and recognizable appeal to the crude mind, irresponsive to any refined

emotion. We do not know what motives or conflicting instincts enter into its estimate of attractiveness. The fact that a dark-complexioned man may find his ideal in a brilliant blonde, and vice versa, does not show that there is no ideal, but rather that considerations of temperament (and, it may be added, education, fashion of the day, and other partial influences) often enter into the judgment and influence the formation of the personal ideal, independently of the existence or non-existence of an absolute ideal.

The question to be answered is this: Does the consensus of the varying and individual conceptions of the perfectly beautiful, as seen in actual examples of physical attainment, indicate a tendency toward agreement on an absolute ideal, as, for instance, in the ideal of Greek sculpture? The consequences of the affirmative resolution of this problem are interesting and important. Darwin himself, in the chapter from which I have quoted, seems to recognize in it a possible negation of his theory of derivation by natural selection. I consider his apprehension to be unfounded, and that there is really no incongruity between the two hypotheses; for, as should never be forgotten, the theory of evolution by natural selection is yet only a theory, a large hypothesis, resting thus far on no firmer basis than the highest probability and the consensus of scientific opinion, the same, mutatis mutandis, as that on which must repose the theory of the ideal. If anybody would dispute this, I have only to quote the words of that Darwinian par excellence, Professor Asa Gray: "Those, if any there be, who regard the derivative hypothesis as satisfactorily proved must have very loose notions as to what proof is."1 And again: "Here proofs, in the proper sense of the word, are not to be had. We are altogether beyond the region of demonstration, and have only probabilities to 1 Darwiniana, p. 135.

I'm going to be blind. But don't tell me to-day. I could n't bear it yet. I suppose you've told hundreds of people the same thing. It does n't mean anything to you. Shall you want me to have an operation? I could n't bear it! I could n't bear it!"

This was her cry, the cry of fear. She could not bear it, whatever it was to be. Meantime, his large white hands, almost divine in their trained gentleness, were upon either side her head, as he placed it on the pillow. He knew there was some virtue either in his touch or in the acquiescent minds of patients, for he could always soothe them. And then, unprepared for speech, he opened his lips and said lightly, surprising himself as much as he did her,

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Well, I don't think you need to be afraid of blindness just yet."

"There!" cried Ferguson. "By Jove! what did I tell you? Last week it was pneumonia, and the week before, your head buzzed. By George! I wish there was a pill for hysteria!" But his tone was kindly and full of relief. St. John guessed that the little eyes, half hidden within their fleshy caverns, were wet with tears.

Mildred was looking at the doctor. "How can you tell me so?" she asked calmly. "How can you?"

He returned her gaze.

"I don't say you haven't more or less trouble with your eyes," he continued, "but my theory would be that you must build up your general health."

"Just what I said," interposed Ferguson. "The general health!"

"Who is your family doctor?" "I hate him," she remarked indifferently.

"Has n't seen him for three years," put in Ferguson. "Just lies here and thinks up diseases, and won't let me call anybody in."

"I should suggest your taking to your self a doctor," advised St. John gravely. "You need to lie in bed awhile; milk,

eggs, massage, trained nurse,

that sort of thing. Then, after a time, have your eyes looked at again. I could send somebody down, if I could n't come myself." He had privately resolved not to come himself. The test was overpowering him. "Now," he concluded, rising, "if I were you, I'd take a little bromide or something, got any bromide in the house? and try to go to sleep. You are going through a strain. Give up to it. Rest."

She reached forward and caught his hand, clinging to it with both hers, drawing it toward her until he thought she meant to touch it with her lips. "Don't go.

"No! no!" she sobbed.

I am so afraid when I am alone. If you go, I shall be alone."

Ferguson drew nearer, not excited by the appeal, as the other man could see, but only wistfully sorry. St. John sat down again, holding her hand.

"You are not to be alone," he said, compelling her attention. "You are not to be alone at all. And you are not to be afraid. There is nothing to be afraid of."

She lay still, her forehead contracted into delicate lines, her lips pitiful. Her lids were down, but the tears trickled underneath them. St. John sat silent until she breathed more calmly, and then took out his tablet and wrote a prescription.

"You'd better send down to the village for this," he said. "It's very simple. Now, remember, you're not going to be afraid or alone. We will take care of you." He touched her hand softly, and her fingers clung.

"When will you come again?" she asked feverishly. And, in spite of himself, he answered,

"When you need me."

Then he got out of the room, Ferguson behind him. When they were outside the door, he said peremptorily:"Send somebody in to her. Who is there here?"