caresses that her entrance had made him refuse--doubtless he had lavished them often enough on his paramour, this wronged girl to whom he was only plain Jack Dawe. Bitterly did she remember her late unuttered thought: "Never have those lips touched the face of a woman." And that it should be this of all women! Le preux chevalier!

66 And I may as well tell your ladyship now,” continued Eliza, thinking to improve the situation, and speaking at her lover as well as to her mistress, "that I shall leave in two months, as we are going to be married. Jack has been always putting it off, but he has promised me faithfully this time."

It wanted no more. "The vile wretch!" Lady Gwendolen longed to cry; but her tongue refused to articulate the words. She cast an agonised look at the Premier and his victim. She saw that he was cowering miserably beneath her glance; but her blurred vision could not perceive the hopeless tears that trickled down his ashen cheeks. For he read in her eyes her suspicion-and the shattering of his dreams.

"Very well, Bathbrill," said Lady Harley, with an effort. "You can go."

As the door closed upon the poor girl, Gwendolen sank into a chair. Her eyes were closed. The Premier rushed forwards, thinking that she had fainted. He took her hand to chafe it. She snatched it away fiercely, opened her eyes, and flashed a look of bitter reproach upon him.

"I am innocent, Gwendolen," he pleaded wildly; "I am innocent!"

“Ah, why did I hope for happiness?" moaned Gwendolen, covering her face with her hands.

Oh, if I could make you happy I would die!" he cried. "I love you, Gwendolen. I am a nobody; but my life is yours to do with it what you will. I have no hope that you will be mine; but pray, pray believe I am innocent."

Lady Gwendolen lifted her head. "Enough of this pitiful burlesque sentiment," she said in a low, scornful tone. "By your own confession, you are a skilful comedian. I understand many things that puzzled me before; my eyes have been opened."

"I love you, Gwendolen !" repeated the Premier despairingly. "I am innocent!"

Again she covered her face with her hands.

"And if I am not innocent I will atone. I love you; but I hope for no return save the permission to dedicate my humble life to your happiness. What, O my dear lady, can I do for you?"

"You can ring that bell in the right-hand corner," replied Gwendolen in a tone of utter misery.

In a second the Premier had done so. A tall, stately footman appeared.

66

Show Mr. Floppington out," said Gwendolen apathetically. The footman stared, and looked from one to the other.

The Premier drew himself up to his full height, took his hat

calmly, made an elaborate bow to Gwendolen, and left the fateful chamber. In the hall he scowled majestically at his attendant, and gave him half-a-sovereign.

"It's d-d awkward!" he muttered furiously as the door slammed behind him. "It's d-d awkward to have another fellow looking like you. D—n Jack Dawe !"

CHAPTER VI.

THE AUTOCRAT AT THE BREAKFAST-TABLE.

"GOOD gracious me!" said the Professor, looking round nervously. "There are thirteen of us!" The Professor was a man who believed that consciousness was a superfluity, and who, abandoning the search for a great central and unifying verity, taught that Truth was only to be found in atoms-from which it should not be hastily inferred that he was in the habit of breaking his word.

The genial host burst into a hearty laugh.

"In fact, my

"You have a quick eye, Mr. Dallox," he said. intention was to have that number during the series of breakfasts I intend to give, in the hope of laying the superstition that still haunts the minds of many. I wonder," he added jocularly, "which sphere of life is to lose a shining light-science, or painting, or literature, or the drama, or politics."

"Don't you consider politics a branch of the drama ?" asked Mr. Bab, looking curiously around the table.

"You may laugh, Mr. Floppington," intervened the Professor, evidently contemplating the extinction of his own superfluous consciousness with anything but satisfaction; "but amid the mass of superstitions it is extremely illogical to suppose that there would not here and there be a germ of truth."

"A germ of truth!" cried Mr. Dagon. "Do you mean to say, Professor, that Truth is catching? And if so, do you propose inoculation to make us truth-proof?"

"Why not?" asked Mr. Bab. "It has long been recognised that Truth is a disease of language."

"Mythology is, you mean," corrected Mr. Claviger.

66 Perhaps he wishes to insinuate that the bulk of our truth is mythology," interposed the Premier.

But the Professor's train of thought was not to be thrown off the track by these interruptions. "The fact that any superstition has come down to us is, on Darwinian principles, a proof of its usefulness." He went on: "The doctrine of the survival of the fittest is as applicable to the history of religion as to the "

"Survival of the fittest!" Mr. Dagon exclaimed contemptuuusly. “If there were any truth in that, we should be a nation of epileptics."

The Professor paused and frowned, but the irreverent Dagon,

supported by the sympathetic smile on the venerable countenance of Mr. Claviger, refused to be sat upon.

"Survival of the fittest!" repeated Mr. Claviger with equal scorn. "Even the beautiful regions of superstition must be invaded by the demon of Darwinism, which can explain everything we don't want explained. Any counter-jumper could have written the 'Origin of Species' if he had a mind to do it."

Quite so," said Dagon; "it's only the mind that would be wanting."

"That is very clever," murmured Bab. "A quotation, I presume."

"My dear sir," replied Dagon, we haven't all got good memories enough to be original. Originality is, I take it, only undetected plagiarism."

"Still," put in Sir John Momus, the illustrious low comedian, "coincidences will happen even in the best-regulated plagiarisms."

"Moi, savez-vous que je suis affreusement superstitieuse?” interposed the great French tragédienne, whom Dagon had already secretly dubbed the skeleton at the feast.

"Before discussing superstition," said the host, suppose we define it. It seems to be a belief in that part of the supernatural in which the definer does not believe."

"Oh, please don't be so clever, Mr. Floppington," pleaded Nelly Shepherd, pausing in her manipulation of the leg of a fowl. "You are as unintelligible as the lines of my new part."

"I'm sure I intended no pun," said the Premier in a hurt tone. May I fill your glass?" His sprightly neighbour assented laughingly, and the little incident seemed to remind the company that they had assembled for more than a feast of reason, and for some moments everybody helped everybody else with that lavish expenditure of unselfishness which causes many people to use up their whole stock at table. It was not without a feeling of pride that Floppington surveyed the snowy expanse of cloth glittering with silver and precious glass, and fragrant with flowers, around which sat men and women whom he had admired and reverenced for years. The sight of the noiseless servants hovering behind the guests, so exquisitely respectful and attentive, so alert and graceful in their movements, added to his serene content. For a moment, indeed, a frown crossed his face. But this was probably due to the vision of another scene which flashed upon him, suggested by contrast-a scene lacking in the daintiness and refinement which surrounded him. It must have been that thought of hungry mouths which sometimes hovers about the table of Dives, and spoils his luxurious meals. Whatever the thought was, it was transient. The Premier busied himself in helping his guests, and for some minutes there was that silence which prevails among well-bred people endeavouring to obscure the fact that they are masticating.

Suddenly Sir John Momus was observed sitting bolt upright with a grave expression on his round countenance, as if he had been surprised by the irruption of an idea. But he said nothing

till Sir Hugh Erlyon, the President of the Royal Academy, who was the comedian's vis-à-vis, taking upon himself to interpret the general sentiment, observed deferentially: "You were about to remark?"

"That it was a very fine day," replied Sir John, his eyes, which were fixed on vacancy, dilating into a perplexed stare as a current of laughter, musical and unmusical, ran round the table.

"To me there is nothing ridiculous in the occasional reminder that Nature has a beautiful picture on view," said Sir Hugh.

"I didn't know you admired Nature," observed Mr. Bab. Sir Hugh looked up in horror at Mr. Bab, who added deprecatingly : "I only mean, you know, that, as an artist, she's just a little bit too realistic, eh? French school, and all that sort of thing. Frankly, now, Sir Hugh, do you think you'd make her an R.A. ?"

But she

Before the President could decide this delicate question, Momus interposed: "I don't know about making her an R.A. certainly wouldn't do for a President. All her stars are remorselessly skied.”

"The truest art is to conceal art," sententiously observed Momus's friend, Lord Thespis, who since he had been raised to the peerage had begun to cultivate an oracular habit. He accompanied the remark by that mysterious and winning smile which never deserted him, even when he thought he had said something original.

"The truest art is to conceal Nature," amended a quiet voice. proceeding from the Marquis of Rockington, who had hitherto amused himself in talking of old times with the fair tragédienne, and who now began to show the cloven hoof. The warm friendship which had sprung up between the ultra-cynical and sceptical man of the world and the orthodox Minister was not the least remarkable phenomenon accompanying the Premier's abandonment of his reserved habits.

"I beg your pardon," said Momus firmly, coming to the defence of his friend, with the natural authoritativeness of a man who was playing every night in a classical burlesque, "the Latin original is artem."

"Art or Nature," responded the Marquis in a bored tone. "You artists manage to conceal both to perfection."

"Unfortunately for satirists," interposed Mr. Claviger, "the weakest part of an epigram is generally the truth of it. Surely no one will now venture to affirm that Turner was unfaithful to Nature. Look, too, at the glorious effects of rain, and mist, and cloud, depicted by so long a line of British landscape painters."

Perhaps it is owing to the climate that English artists have taken so naturally to water-colours?" put in Mr. Dagon.

"Oh, no doubt the environment largely affects the artistic instincts of a people," said Mr. Dallox.

"Oh, do please explain that big word," said the sprightly Miss Shepherd, with an arch side-glance at Mr. Claviger, who smiled in

return.

L

The Professor laid down his fork, and cleared his throat with an Albemarle Street cough.

"Est-ce qu'il va nous faire un cours?" whispered the divine Sarah, throwing a reproachful glance at Miss Shepherd.

66

"Never mind, old boy," said Nelly, with that delightful chic in which she was without a rival. I'll let you off. Besides, you could never make me understand."

"Nonsense!" said the Professor sharply. "Have you not heard that my books are noted for their popular character?"

"I never knew before that you had succeeded in making the Lobster a popular character," said Dagon, "though you have analysed him so minutely in your best-known scientific fiction. To make popular characters you should sketch broadly à la Dickens. All you have done is to show that he is rather a queer fish, and that we all knew before."

Anyhow, he makes very good salad," said Floppington. And everybody laughed, which encouraged the host, who had hitherto been somewhat silent, enjoying the conversation as if he had paid for it, though a little overpowered by the talent assembled round his hospitable board.

"I always endeavour to speak the language of the people, and I am sure a great part of my success is due to this," continued the unruffled Professor.

"No doubt," said the Marquis drily. "The most popular philosopher is he who makes people think they think."

"For my part I must confess," said Mr. Alderney Lightfoot, desisting from his long attempt to find enough rhymes to silver to furnish a rondeau. "I think your books too clear to be of any value as literature."

"I cannot serve two masters—Sense and Nonsense-at once," replied the Professor warmly.

66

It strikes me that you scientific gentlemen don't always serve the master you think," said Mr. Claviger. "When I see Miss Shepherd dancing, I thank Heaven that made her graceful and happy, whereas the eye with the Evolution squint can only see in her a cross between a dodo and a daddy-longlegs."

Miss Nelly made a comic moue, which, together with the ridiculous description of her, set everybody laughing. But Mr. Claviger went on with sombre solemnity :

It is not for nothing that ever since the year of the publication of the 'Origin of Species,' the sky has been darkened by a stormcloud. But what care we now if the fathomless depths of bluethe visible type of infinity and eternity-have been indignantly veiled from our grovelling vision? Intent on the physical processes of growth, we have forgotten the breath of the Spirit. Man is dead, but the 'featherless biped' who is left alive is untouched by the beauty of the Heavens and the Earth. Would, at least, that their beauty were untouched by him! The miserable creature must needs scar the faces of both with lines of ugliness, leaving himself nothing to worship but Sunday, and he goes and worships that in