"Yes," he said, "you have guessed right. It is the Vorschrift, the prescription for the manufacture of Malgamite." She took the paper and turned it over curiously. Then, with her usual audacity, she opened it and began to read.

"Ah," she said, "it is in Hebrew." Von Holzen nodded his head, and held out his hand for the paper, which she gave to him. She was not afraid of the manbut she was very near to fear.

"And I am sitting here quietly under the trees, Fräulein," he said, "learning it by heart."

ent; for the season there is in the winter, as in many Continental capitals."

One of the numerous advantages attached to a hereditary title is the certainty that a hearer of some sort or another will always be forth-coming. A commoner finds himself snubbed or quietly abandoned so soon as his reputation for the utterance of egoisms and platitudes is sufficiently established, but there are always plenty of people ready and willing to be bored by a lord. A highclass club is, moreover, a very mushroombed of bores, where elderly gentlemen who have travelled quite a distance down the road of life without finding out that it is bordered on either side by a series of small events not worth commenting upon meet to discuss trivialities.

"Truth is," said his lordship to one of these persons, "this Malgamite scheme is one of the largest charities that I have conducted, and carries with it certain responsibilities- yes, certain responsibilities."

And he assumed a grave air of importance almost amounting to worry.

For

Lord Ferriby did not know that a worried look is an almost certain indication of a small mind. Nor had he observed that those who bear the greatest responsibilities, and have proved themselves worthy of the burden, are precisely they who show the serenest face to the world.

It must not, however, be imagined that Lord Ferriby was in reality at all uneasy respecting the Malgamite scheme. Here again he enjoyed one of the advantages of having been preceded by a grandfather able and willing to serve his party with out too minute a scruple. For if the king can do no wrong, the nobility may surely claim a certain immunity from criticism, and those who have allowance made to them must inevitably learn to make allowance for themselves. Lord Ferriby was, in a word, too self-satisfied to harbor any doubts respecting his own conduct. Self-satisfaction is, of course, indolence in disguise.

It was easy enough for Lord Ferriby to persuade himself that Cornish was wrong and Roden in the right; especially when Roden, in the most gentlemanly manner possible, paid a check, not to Lord Ferriby direct, but to his bankers, in what he gracefully termed the form of a bonus upon the heavy subscription originally advanced by his lordship. There are many people in the world who will accept money so long as their delicate susceptibilities are not offended by an actual sight of the check.

"Anthony Cornish," said Lord Ferriby, pulling down his waistcoat, "like many men who have had neither training nor experience, does not quite understand the ethics of commerce.

His lordship, like others, seemed to understand these to mean that a man may take anything that his neighbor is fool enough to part with.

Joan was willing enough to accompany her father, because in the great march of social progress she had passed on from charity to sanitation, and was convinced that the mortality among the Malgamiters, which had been more than hinted at in the Ferriby family circle, was entirely due to the negligence of the victims in not using an old disinfectant served up in artistic flagons under a new name. Permanganate of potash under another name will not only smell as sweet, but will perform greater sanitary wonders, because the world places faith

in a new name, and faith is still the greatest healer of human ills.

Joan therefore proposed to carry to the Hague the glad tidings of the sanitary millennium, fully convinced that this had come to a suffering world under the name of "" Nuxine," in small bottles, at the price of one shilling and a penny half-penny. The penny half-penny, no doubt, represented the cost of bottle and drug and the small blue ribbon securing the stopper, while the shilling went very properly into the manufacturer's pocket. It was at this time the fashion in Joan's world to smell of "Nuxine," which could also be had in the sweetest little blue tabloids, to place in the wardrobe and among one's clean clothes. Joan had given Major White a box of these tabloids, which gift had been accepted with becoming gravity. Indeed, the Major seemed never to tire of hearing Joan's exordiums, or of watching her pretty, earnest face as she urged him to use "Nuxine" in its various forms, and it was only when he heard that cigar-holders made of "Nuxine" absorbed all the deleterious properties of tobacco that his stout heart failed him.

"Yes," he pleaded, "but a fellow must draw the line at a sky-blue cigar-holder, you know."

And Joan had to content herself with the promise that he would use none other than "Nuxine" dentifrice.

Lord Ferriby and Joan, therefore, set out to the Hague, his lordship in the full conviction (enjoyed by so many useless persons) that his presence was in itself of beneficial effect upon the course of events, and Joan with her "Nuxine" and, in a minor degree now, her “Malgamiters" and her "Haberdashers' Assistants." Lady Ferriby preferred to remain at Cambridge Terrace, chiefly because it was cheaper, and also because the cook required a holiday, and, with a kitchenmaid only, she could indulge in her greatest pleasure--a useless economy. The cook refused to starve her fellow-servants, while the kitchen - maid, mindful of a written character in the future, did as her ladyship bade her-hashing and mincing in a manner quite irreconcilable with forty pounds a year and beer-money.

Major White met the travellers at the Hague station, and Joan, who had had some trouble with her father during the simple journey, was conscious for the

was that he ranged himself stolidly on Cornish's side in the differences that had arisen.

Lord Ferriby was dimly conscious of a smouldering antagonism, but knew the Major sufficiently well not to fear an outbreak of hostilities. Men who will face opposition may be divided into two classes-the one taking its stand upon a conscious rectitude, the other half hiding with the cheap and transparent cunning of the ostrich. Many men, also, are in the fortunate condition of believing themselves to be invariably right unless they are told quite plainly that they are wrong. there was nobody to tell Lord Ferriby this. Cornish, with a sort of respect for the head of the family--a regard for the office irrespective of its holder-was so far from wishing to convince his uncle

And

Lord Ferriby heard, however, with some uneasiness, that the Wades were in the Hague.

"A worthy man-a very worthy man," he said, abstractedly; for he looked upon the banker with that dim suspicion which is aroused in certain minds by uncompromising honesty.

The travellers proceeded to the hotel, where rooms had been prepared for them. There were flowers in Joan's room, which her maid said she had rearranged, so awkwardly had they been placed in the vase. The Wades, it appeared, were out, and had announced their intention of not returning to lunch. They were, the hotel porter thought, to take that meal at Mrs. Vansittart's.

"I think," said Lord Ferriby, "that I will go down to the works.'

"Yes, do," answered White, with an expressionless countenance.

"Perhaps you will accompany me?" suggested Joan's father.

"No-think not. Can't hit it off with Roden. Perhaps Joan would like to see the Palace in the Wood."

Joan thought that it was her duty to go to the Malgamite works, and murmured the word " Nuxine," without, however, much enthusiasm; but White happened to remember that it was mixing day. So Lord Ferriby went off alone in a hired carriage, as had been his intention from the first; for White knew even less about the ethics of commerce than did Cornish.

The account of affairs that awaited his lordship at the works was, no doubt, satisfactory enough, for the manufacture of Malgamite had been proceeding at high pressure night and day. Von Holzen had, as he told Marguerite, been poor all his life, and poverty is a hard task-master. He was not going to be poor again. The gray carts had been passing up and down Park Straat more often than ever, taking their loads to one or other of the railway stations, and bringing, as they passed her house, a gleam of anger to Mrs. Vansittart's eyes.

"The scoundrels!" she muttered. "The scoundrels! Why does not Tony act?"

But Tony Cornish, who alone knew the full extent of Von Holzen's determi

up Park Straat when the party assembled there had risen from the luncheon table. Mrs. Vansittart and Mr. Wade were standing together at the window, which was large even in this city of large and spotless windows. Dorothy and Cornish were talking together at the other end of the room, and Marguerite was supposed to be looking at a book of photographs.

"There goes a consignment of men's lives," said Mrs. Vansittart to her companion.

‘A human life, madam," answered the banker, "like all else on earth, varies much in value."

For Mr. Wade belonged to that class of Englishmen which has a horror of all sentiment, and takes care to cloak its good actions by the assumption of an unworthy motive. And who shall say that this man of business was wrong in his statement? Which of us has not a few friends and relations who can only have been created as a solemn warning?

As Mrs. Vansittart and Mr. Wade stood at the window, Marguerite joined them, slipping her hand within her father's arm with that air of protection which she usually assumed towards him. She was gay and lively, as she ever was, and Mrs. Vansittart glanced at her more than once with a sort of envy. Mrs. Vansittart did not, in truth, always understand Marguerite or her English, which was essentially modern.

They were standing and laughing at the window, when Marguerite suddenly drew them back.

"What is it?" asked Mrs. Vansittart. "It is Lord Ferriby," replied Marguerite.

And looking cautiously between the lace curtains, they saw the great man drive past in his hired carriage.

"He has recently bought Park Straat," commented Marguerite. And his lordship's condescending air certainly seemed to suggest that the street, if not the whole city, belonged to him.

Mr. Wade pointed with his thick thumb in the direction in which Lord Ferriby was driving.

"Where is he going?" he asked, bluntly. "To the Malgamite works," replied Mrs. Vansittart, with significance.

And Mr. Wade made no comment. Mrs. Vansittart spoke first.

must have been in the North-of-Maine woods, for he only came out of his lair once, which was sufficient for William, as, indeed, it was for me. That occasion was one of importance in the history of both our lives. William and I had been friends for many years, as, I believe, we shall be for as many years as are allotted us upon this game-stocked earth; but that single step of his out of the world and into the city was near being the close of all friendly relations between us. It happened that at my suggestion William appeared in New York once on a time, and before I had succeeded in transporting him from the railway to the seclusion of my four walls he had attracted the attention of some twenty thousand persons on Broadway, and had very nearly decapitated a policeman.

Yet he is remarkable for other things than his looks. He is an original in every way, is William, more especially in his birth. No one to look upon him could doubt that he was an Indian some centuries back. Some time after the arrival of the Mayflower he took upon himself the qualities of the Puritan; and finally, no one to know him could doubt that he had developed from some New

VOL. XCVII.-No. 577.-13

ease. As a Puritan he not only objects to deceit in others, but takes the severest measures at hand to punish it. As a Yankee he usually secures whatever moneys you may have brought into his country.

Nevertheless, if it were not for the extraordinary wisdom of William he would long ago have spiked his metaphorical guns and gone over to the kingdom of Rock and Rye. Many a time when money fails to persuade him to a bit of still-hunting, whiskey will quicken his sporting spirit, and all the tales which he has but a moment before poured forth to show that neither moose nor deer ever haunted this or that particular region are airily waived, and acknowledged to be-what in reality they have been all along - lies such as are only heard in the Canada timber.

Still there never was an honester chap. He will bring you up to a moose with the utmost skill after hours of work, unless you have come into the woods to bag a cart-load of heads. Then William takes on the robes of governmental office. He has been running over Maine these twenty years. He has seen practical demonstrations of what the game laws have