for grinding old people young again, and I could even stand being examined for a commission in the guards, though that is now a next to impossible ordeal. My cousin, Jack Dawson, was desired to turn John Gilpin into Greek iambics, and to recapitulate according to their ages the names of Queen Anne's thirteen children who died infants: he had to tell in what year Priam was born, and who were all the prime ministers in Europe coeval with Cardinal Wolsey."

"That signifies little to any mortal now alive, certainly; and, I dare say, very few of the heroes at Waterloo could have answered," observed Lady Edith. "Young people's intellects are all annihilated by excessive examining, and I almost think too little learning better than too much. I knew one young officer, who fought like a lion, and was the most original entertaining observer of life and manners in the world, yet, when asked if England were ever conquered by a foreign foe, he answered with admirable correctness, Yes! by the Spanish Armada.""

"Some of these questions are of no more real use than if you were desired to name the exact number of the Hansom cab, in which I went last week to the opera; and I do think when any young candidate is plucked, like my poor cousin Jack Dawson, a list should be published of the questions that extinguished him. At present the

examiners can bamboozle any one and reject him, which gives them a most arbitrary power. They could puzzle Babbage in arithmetic, or even myself in history."

"You are a perfect Macaulay I suppose?" asked Lady Edith smiling, "and ready for first class honours in Hume and Gibbon."

"Not exactly. My favourite historians are Shakspeare, Waverley, and some of the new operas; Lucrezia Borgia, for instance, and Marie Stuart. Pray," added the stranger, turning to Beatrice, "how do you like 'Les Huguenots?' and are you an admirer of Jenny Lind?"

"I never was at an opera in my life," replied Beatrice, blushing with graceful timidity on finding herself addressed; while the stranger watched with clandestine admiration the little conflict of shyness and amusement which brightened her countenance, as she added, "I should like much to hear Jenny Lind for once."

"Then comfort yourself for not having seen her, that life has still something to show. It is a perfect trance of delight the first time, but I tired even of her, as I do of everybody and of everything. One goes to the opera to be bored, rather than stay to be bored at home. If anything can add a feather to the wing of time it is a help!"

"You are a second Byron," observed Lady Edith, smiling at the disconsolate tone of helpless weariness in which her young companion spoke.

"Sated abroad, all seen but nought admired,

The weary spirit is driv'n to wander home,

Sated at home, of wife and children tired,'

"No! no! pardon me! the wife and children are a source of weariness yet to come," interrupted the incognito, stealthily watching the effect of his unmitigated nonsense in lighting up the lovely young countenance of Beatrice with smiles of wondering amusement. She looked as if it would take a week to recover her gravity, for he was a new variety in human nature to Beatrice, who had never before seen a perfectly satiated man of fashion, with apparently not a thing to wish for or to do, except talking nonsense au naturel.

"There is an awkward corner in every man's life, when he first discovers, like me, that among the many roads in life, he has not chosen the best. The fact is," he added pettishly," that after wandering for years over the uncivilized world, I am a tired bird wearily looking for a quiet perch, and come to try the greatest of all varieties to mestaying at home. I am actually planning now to settle in Great Britain!"

"That means probably," said Lady Edith, "three months in this country and the other nine

elsewhere! The habit of vagabondizing abroad is like the habit of taking snuff, which cannot be left off."

"You are perhaps right. I must return occasionally to Florence, the 'City of flowers;' I must wander sometimes in the dusky forests of Vallambrosa, and stroll now and then in the fair gardens of Pratolino, adorned as they are and guarded by the gigantic Padre Apennino of antediluvian memory. Still, though everything in life is a bore, it sounds very well to my romantic ear, the domestic peace of a British home, in such a little duodecimo cottage as that before us; which looks as if it had been copied out of a young lady's album, or off a China plate."

"Take care what you say, for that little rosecovered hut, which you once visited before, is mine," interrupted Lady Edith gaily. "We shelter our little home with an umbrella, water it with a watering pot, and rake up the garden with a silver fork."

"What a perfect gem it is! more like the vision of a dream than a solid reality," exclaimed the stranger with unaffected admiration. "It is very seldom in two or three life-times one sees anything so thoroughly pretty! There are more brilliant bouquets in that tiny space than in the conservatory at Eaglescairn, and the roses seem all to flower with their whole hearts. Here you appear

to have the usual English neighbourhood, invariably found in one's travels everywhere. The grand dull old feudal castle such as Eaglescairn, the county-member family, like the McAlpines at Cairngorum Castle, and the 'cottage of gentility,' well worth them all. Were I transplanted into such a more than beautiful home as yours, might I not forget at last, in such refined enjoyment, that among the brightest flowers in the garden of this world I am myself only a weed?"

The young man's voice became saddened as he spoke, and his countenance for some moments assumed an aspect of seriousness; but suddenly shaking this off, he looked laughingly at Beatrice, saying, "I see a smile of the prettiest disdain hiding itself under a straw-bonnet at this moment, which is very distressing to my vanity. You must not, however, mistake me for Lord Hate-good, and become Miss Much-afraid! No: take the benefit of my long experience, and believe that all the most agreeable friendships are made as to-day, without introductions, and that ours will turn out inestimable. There is a sort of stolen pleasure in impromptu acquaintances, that gives a zest of romance to the most casual stranger's society. A propos to nothing-did you ladies ever happen by chance to see young Sir Allan McAlpine, whose property lies in this neighbourhood?"

How strange that accidental question sounded