ner, and very attentive to her-was nevertheless obviously on the watch, and certain to resent any remark that might by chance miss him and glance by towards her. Certainly, these were not comfortable conditions for a pleasant walk. Tita afterwards declared that she was calculating with satisfaction that she had already got through several hours of that terrible day. The sun was shining far away on the blue Malvern hills. Along the level meadows the lines of pollard willows were grey and silvery in the breezy light. Close at hand the rich masses of green were broken by the red sandstone bank opposite; while the tall trees above sent straggling duplicates of themselves coloured in deep chocolatebrown-down into the lazy stream that flowed beneath us. And as we sat there and listened for the first ominous observation of one or another of these young folks, lo! there glided into the clear white and blue channel of the river a gailybedizened barge that gleamed and glittered in the sunlight and sent quivering lines of colour down into the water. The horse came slowly along the road. The long rope rustled over the brushwood on the bank, and splashed on the surface of the stream. The orange and scarlet bands of the barge stole away up and through that world of soft greenness that lay under the shadow of the opposite bank; and then the horse, and rope, and driver turned the corner of a field, and we saw them no more. The appearance of the barge had provoked attention, and secured silence. When it was gone the Lieutenant turned carelessly to Arthur, and said "Do you go back to London tomorrow?" "I don't know," said the young man, gloomily. "It is such a pity you can't come with us, Arthur," says Bell, very gently, as if begging for a civil reply. "I have no doubt you will enjoy yourselves very well," he replies, with a certain coldness in his tone. "We have hitherto," she says, look ing down; "the weather has been so good-and-and the scenery was pleasant-and-and-" It was Arthur himself, singularly enough, who came to the rescue, little knowing that he was affording her such relief. "I don't think you have chosen the right road," he remarked. "The real reminiscences of the old stage-coach days you will find on the York and Berwick road to Scotland. I never heard of anyone going to Scotland this way." 66 Why," says one of the party, with a laugh that seemed to startle the silence around, "that is the very reason we chose it." "I have been thinking for some time," he says, coldly, "of getting a dog-cart and driving up the old route to Scotland." The heavens did not fall on him. Queen Tita looked at the tips of her gloves, and said nothing; but Bell, having less of scepticism about her, immediately cried out "Oh, Arthur, don't do that, it will be dreadfully wretched for you going away on such an excursion by yourself." But the young man saw that his proposal-I will swear it had never entered his brain before that very minute -had produced an effect; and treated it as a definite resolve. "At least, if you are going, you might as well come with us, or meet us further on, where the roads join," says Bell. "No, I am not so mad as to go your way," he replied, with an air of disdain. "I shall keep out of the rainy districts, and I mean to go where one can find traces of the old times still hanging about." "And pray," I venture to ask him, are all the old inns confined to one part of this unfortunate country? And were there no ways of getting to Scotland but by York and Berwick? Why, over the whole country there is a network of routes along which stagecoaches used to run. And if you should be tired of driving alone, you can do no better than strike across country from York by the old coach-road that comes on to Penrith, and so go up with us through Carlisle and Moffat on to Edinburgh." "I am not so sure that I shall go alone," he said, quite fiercely. What did the boy mean? Was he going to drive a white elephant about the country? "Do you know much of the management of horses?" says the Lieutenant, meaning no harm whatever. "Arthur is in the volunteer artillery, -the field artillery, do they call it?and of course he has to manage horses," explains my Lady. 66 Oh, you are a volunteer?" said the Lieutenant with quite an accession of interest. "That is a very good thing. I think all the young men of this country would do much good to their health and their knowledge by being volunteers and serving a time of military service." "But we don't like compulsion here," says Arthur, bluntly. "That," retorts the Lieutenant, with a laugh, "is why you are at present a very ill-educated country." "At all events," says Arthur, rather hotly, "we are educated well enough to have thrown aside the old superstitions of feudalism and divine right; and we are too well educated to suffer a despotic government and a privileged aristocracy to have it all their own way." "Oh, you do talk of Prussia," said the Count. 66 'Well, we are not perfect in Prussia. We have many things to learn and to do, that we might have done if we had been preserved round about by the sea, like you. But I think we have done very well for all that: and if we have a despotic government, which I do not think, it is perhaps because what is good for England is not always good for every other country; and if we have an aristocracy, they work for the country just like the sons of the peasants, when they go into the army, and get small pay, instead of going abroad like your aristocracy, and gambling away their fortunes to the Jews and the horse-dealers, and getting into debt and making very much fools of themselves." "When we of this country," says Arthur, proudly, "see the necessity of military preparations, we join the ranks of a body that accepts no pay, but is none the less qualified to fight when that is wanted." "Oh, I do say nothing against your volunteers. No, on the contrary, I think it is an excellent thing for the young men. And it would be better if the service was continuous for one, two, three years-and they go away into barrack life-and have much drill and exercise in the open air, and make the young men of the cities hardy and strong. That would be a very good army then, I think; for when the men are intelligent and educated, they have less chance of panic-which is the worst that can happen in a battle-and they will not skulk away, or lose their courage, because they have so much selfrespect. But I do not know whether this is safer to have the more ignorant men of the peasantry and country people who will take their drill like machines and go through it all, and continue firing in great danger, because they are like machines. Now, if you had your towns fighting against the country, and if you had your town volunteers and your country regiments with the same amount of instruction, I think the country troops would win, although each man might not have as much patriotism and education and self-respect as in the town soldiers. Because the country troops would march long distances-and would not be hurt much by rain or the sleeping out at night-and they would go through their duties like machines when the fight commenced. But your city volunteers-they have not yet got anything like the training of your regular troops that come from the country villages and towns." "I know this," says Arthur, "that if there was to be an invasion of this country by Prussia, a regiment of our city volunteers would not be afraid to meet a regiment of your professional soldiers, however countrified and mechanical they may be "Ah, but that is a great mistake you make," says the Lieutenant, taking no notice of the challenge; "our soldiers are not of any single class they are from all classes, from all towns, and villages, and cities alike-much more like your volunteers than your regular soldiers, only that they have some more drill and experience than your volunteers. And what do you say of an invasion? I have heard some people talk of that nonsense-but only in England. Is it that you are afraid of invasion that you imagine these foolish things, and talk so much of it?" says 'No, we are not afraid of itArthur, evidently casting about for some biting epigram. "Yet no one in all Europe speaks or thinks of such a thing but a few of your people here, who give great amusement to us at home." "There would be amusement of another sort going," says Arthur, getting a little red. And just at this instant, before he We set out. The Lieutenant wilfully way. Bell's looks are cast down; Arthur 66 Well, we have got so far over the "But day!" said my Lady, with a sigh. I suppose we must ask him to dine with us." says the "Is it necessary, Madame ? Lieutenant. "But perhaps you might ask him to bring better manners with him." "I am afraid he has been very rude to you," said Tita, with some show of compunction. "To me? No. That is not of any consequence whatever, but I did think that all this pleasant walk has been spoiled to Mademoiselle and yourself by-by what shall I say not rudeness, but a fear of rudeness. And yet, what reason is there for it ?" "I don't know," was the reply, "But I uttered in rather a low voice. hope Bell is not being annoyed by him now." You see, that was the way in which they had got to regard this unfortunate youth-as a sort of necessary evil, which was to be accepted with such equanimity as Heaven had granted to the various sufferers. It never occurred to them to look at the matter from Arthur's point of view, or to reflect that there was probably no more wretched creature in the whole of England than he was during this memorable Sunday. Consider how he spent the day. It was the one day on which he would have the chance of seeing Bell for an unknown period. He comes round in the morning to find her sitting at breakfast with his rival. He accompanies them on a walk into the country; finds himself "the third wheel to the cart," and falls behind to enjoy the spectacle of seeing her walk by the side of this other man, talking to him, and sharing with him the beautiful sights and sounds around. Ye who have been transfixed by the red-hot skewers of jealousy, think of the torture which this wretched young man suffered on this quiet Sunday morning. Then as he walks home with her, he finds her, as we afterwards learn, annoyed about certain remarks of his. He explains in a somewhat saucy manner, and makes matters worse. Then he takes to reproaches, and bids her reflect on what people will say; and here again he goes from one blunder to another in talking in such a fashion to a proud and highspirited girl, who cannot suffer herself to be suspected. In his blindness of anger and jealousy, he endeavours to asperse the character of the Lieutenanthe is like other officers-everyone knows what the Prussian officers, in general, are-what is the meaning of this thing, and the dark suspicion suggested by that? To all of these representations Bell replies with some little natural warmth. He is driven wild by her defence of his rival. He declares that he knows something about the Lieutenant's reputation and then she, probably with a little paleness in her face, stands still, and asks him calmly to say what it is. He will not. He is not going to carry tales. Only, when an English lady has so little care of what people may say as to accept this foreign adventurer as her companion during a long journey That was all that Bell subsequently told Tita. The boy was obviously mad and reckless, but none the less he had' wrought such mischief as he little dreamed of in uttering these wild complaints and suspicions. When we got back to the hotel, he and Bell had overtaken us, and they had the appearance of not being on the best of terms. fact, they had maintained silence for the last quarter of an hour of the walk. In My Lady asked Arthur to dine with us at seven; so that during the interval he was practically dismissed. Seven came, and Arthur appeared. He was in evening dress; conveying a rebuke to uncouth people like ourselves, who were in our ordinary travelling costume. But Bell's seat was vacant. After we had waited a few minutes, Queen Tita went to inquire for her, and in a few minutes returned. "Bell is very sorry, but she has a headache, and would rather not come down to dinner." Arthur looked up with an alarmed face; the Lieutenant scowled ; and Tita, taking her seat, said she was afraid we had walked too far in the morning. Strange. If you had seen our Bell walking lightly up to the top of Box-hill and running down again-just by way of amusement before lunch-you would not have expected that a short walk of a mile or two along a level river-course would have had such an effect. But so it was; and we had dinner before us. It was not an enlivening meal; and the less said about it the better. Arthur talked much of his driving to Scotland in a dog-cart, and magnified the advantages of the York route over that we were now following. It is quite certain that he had never thought of such a thing before that morning; but the attention that had been drawn to it, and the manner in which he had been led to boast of it, promised actually_to commit him to this piece of folly. The mere suggestion of it had occurred at the impulse of a momentary vexation; but the more he talked of it, the more he pledged himself to carry out his preposterous scheme. Tita heard and wondered, scarcely believing; but I could see plainly that the young man was determined to fulfil his promise if only by way of triumphant bravado, to show his independence of us, and perhaps inspire Bell with envy and regret. When he left that night, something was said about his coming to see us away on the following morning. Tita had shown. her usual consideration in not referring at all to our drive of the next day, which she understood was to be through the most charming scenery. And when, that same night, she expressed a vague desire that we might slip away on the next morning before Arthur had come, it was with no thought of carrying such a plan into execution. Perhaps she thought with some pity of the young man who, after seeing us drive away again into the country, and the sweet air, and the sunlight, would return disconsolately to his dingy rooms in the Temple, there to think of his absent sweetheart, or else to meditate that wild journey along a parallel line which was to show her that he, too, had his enjoy ments. By a [Note.-I find that the remarks which Queen Titania appended to the foregoing pages when they were written, have since been torn off; and I can guess the reason. A few days ago [ received a letter, sent under cover to the publishers, which bore the address of that portion of the country familiarly called "the Dukeries." It was written in a feminine hand, and signed with a family name which has some historical pretensions. Now these were the observations which this silly person in high places had to communicate:-“Sir, I hope you will forgive my intruding myself upon you in this way; but I am anxious to know whether you really do think living with such a woman as your wife is represented to be, is really a matter for raillery and amusement. My object in writing to you is to say that, if you can treat lightly the fact of a wife being waspish at every turn, cuffing her boys' ears, and talking of whipping, it would have been better not to have made your extraordinary complaisance public; for what is to prevent the most ill-tempered woman pointing to these pages, and saying that that is how a reasonable husband would deal with her? If it is your misfortune to have an ill-tempered wife, you ought not to try to persuade people that you are rather proud of it. Pray forgive my writing thus frankly to you; and I am, Sir, your obedient servant, great mischance I left this letter lying open on the breakfast-table; and Tita, coming in, and being attracted by the crest in gold and colours on the paper, took it up. With some dismay, I watched her read it. She laid it down-stood irresolute for a moment, with her lips getting rather tremulous-then she suddenly fled into the haven she had often sought before, and looking up with the clear brown eyes showing themselves frightened and pained, like those of some dumb creature struck to the heart, she said, "Is it true? Am I really ill-tempered? Do I really vex you very much?" You may be sure that elderly lady up in Nottinghamshire had an evil quarter of an hour of it when we proceeded to discuss the question, and when Queen Tita had been pacified and reassured. "But we ought to have known," she said. "Count von Rosen warned us that stupid persons would make the mistake. And to say that I cuffed my boys' ears! Why, you know that even in the Magazine it says that I cuffed the boys and kissed them at the same time-of course, in fun-and I threatened to whip the whole house-of course, in fun, you know, when everybody was in good spirits about going away-and now that wicked old woman would make me out an unnatural mother, and a bad wife, and I don't know what! I-I-I will get Bell to draw a portrait of her, and put it in an exhibition-that would serve her right." And forthwith she sat down and wrote to the two boys at Twickenham, promising them I know not what luxuries and extravagances when they came home for the Easter holidays. But she is offended with the public, all through that gabbling old lady in Notts; and will have no more communication with it, at least for the present.] To be continued. |