in that direction many times during dinner, and I felt that the dear girl I loved so fondly was in an atmosphere of falsehood. What was the nature of the past acquaintance between those two people? and why was it tacitly denied by both of them? If it had been an ordinary friendship, there could have been no reason for this concealment and suppression. I had never quite made up my mind to trust Angus Egerton, though I liked and admired him; and this mysterious relation between him and Augusta Darrell was a sufficient cause for serious distrust.

I wish she cared for him less,' I said to myself, as I glanced at Milly's bright happy face.

When we went back to the drawing-room after dinner, the Miss Collingwoods had a great deal to say to Milly about a grand croquetmatch which was to take place in a week or two at Pensildon, Sir John and Lady Pensildon's place, fourteen miles from Thornleigh. The Rector's daughters, both of whom were several years older than Milly, were passionately fond of croquet and everything in the way of gaiety, and were full of excitement about this coming event, discussing what they were going to wear, and what Milly was going to wear, on the occasion. While they were engaged in this way, Mrs. Collingwood told me a long story about one of her poor parishioners, always an inexhaustible subject with her. This arrangement left Mrs. Darrell unoccupied; and after standing at one of the open windows looking listlessly out, she sauntered out upon the terrace, her favourite lounge always in this summer weather. I saw her repass the windows a few minutes afterwards, in earnest conversation with Angus Egerton. This was some time before the other gentlemen left the dining-room; and they were still walking slowly up and down when Mr. Darrell and the Rector came to the drawing-room. The storm had not yet come, and it was bright moonlight. Mr. Darrell went out and brought his wife in, with some gentle reproof on her imprudence in remaining out of doors so late in her thin muslin dress.

After this there came some music. Augusta Darrell sang some old English ballads which I had never heard her sing before-simple pathetic melodies, which, I think, brought tears to the eyes of all of us. Mr. Egerton sat near one of the open windows, with his face in shadow, while she was singing; and as she began the last of these old songs he rose with a half-impatient gesture, and went out upon the terrace. If I watched him closely, and others in relation to him, at this time, it was from no frivolous or impertinent curiosity, but because I felt very certain my darling's happiness was at stake. I saw her little disappointed look as he kept his place far away from her for the rest of that evening, instead of contriving by some means to be near her, as he always had done during our pleasant evenings at the Rectory.

SHIPS ON THE SEA

I LAUNCH'D a shallop on the sea,

I wrote Ambition' round the prow;

It sped before the breezes free

White broke the wave beneath the bow.

The calm gray sky of early morn

Was fleck'd and barr'd with golden cloud, As onward that small bark was borne,

While fresh'ning breezes shrill'd the shroud.

MRS. HARRIS

CHARLES DICKENS has left us an immortal Mrs. Harris-a myth of marvellous influence, whose priestess and prophetess was the irrepressible Sairey Gamp. This is not the lady of whom I am now to write. She needs no farther biographer. She is the eternal enigma of fiction, and will dwell in mysterious obscurity long after the epitaph on Elia Lælia Crispis has been explained; long after the sources of the Nile have been mapped; ay, until the Greek calends. She dwells apart-the bodiless creation of the imaginative brain of Mrs. Gamp.

But the Mrs. Harris of whom I now attempt to give some slight account was a very tangible and palpable personage, who made her mark in the world. What I have to say about her is based on the Letters of the first Earl of Malmesbury, edited by his grandson, the present Earl. Mrs. Harris was the wife of the eccentric and erudite author of Hermes, and mother of one James Harris, whose diplomatic services raised him to the peerage. Hermes Harris, as students of the last century's obscure literature are aware, was an odd sort of man, with proclivities for metaphysics and music, yet quite able to occupy a good second-rate position in politics. He rode his hobbies pretty hard, but did not allow them to run away with him. Of this the best proof is, that he held respectable official positions; was a Lord of the Admiralty and of the Treasury, and died Comptroller of Queen Charlotte's household. He lived at Salisbury, in an ancient mansion grafted upon and including part of the old ramparts of the Close, with a regular warren of rooms on various levels.' His wife is the theme of this brief paper. She was a constant correspondent of her son, whether he was studying at Oxford or the Hague, or doing diplomacy at Madrid or Berlin or St. Petersburg; and her letters are charming for their vivacity, and for the graphic style in which they narrate the events of the day. She has been dead ninety years. I wonder if any rising politician of the present day has a mother who can send him such delightful epistles. I greatly doubt it.

For the art of letter-writing seems lost. The penny post and the telegraph have ruined it. The old-fashioned generous sheet of gossip and scandal and epigram never gives a zest to the breakfasttable in these days. You are supposed to see everything in the paper. But then you don't see everything in the paper; journalists are not behind the scenes. They tell you, rather tardily, that one man has discarded his wife, and that another has disappointed his creditors; but they fail to furnish the true causes of such occur

rences. Especially has the lady letter - writer disappeared: publishers have found her out, and she devotes herself to three-volume novels. I prefer her fact to her fiction. I would rather have one of her charming letters-ay, even though it were crossed-than the most exciting story that her vivid brain can possibly produce.

It may be observed that events a century ago offered a finer field for the lady with a genius for gossip. The high people, as Thackeray would style them, were fewer than they are now, and lived much faster. Gambling was open, and duelling fashionable. Let me take at random a little of Mrs. Harris's evidence on these matters. Writing in 1770, she tells her son that a new assembly or meeting is set up at Boodle's, called Lloyd's Coffee-room; Miss Lloyd, whom you have seen with Lady Pembroke, being the sole inventor.' What would the tame and old-fogyish Boodle's of to-day think of such an invasion of the Amazons? They meet every morning, either to play cards, chat, or do whatsoever they please. An ordinary is to be provided for as many as choose to dine, and a supper to be constantly on the table by eleven at night. After supper they play loo.' I wonder whether Miss Lloyd's name was Louisa; and if so, whether she was nicknamed Unlimited Loo. Observe, this was a very exclusive business: there were only twenty-six members, chosen by ballot; and they began by black-balling the Duchess of Bedford and Lord March. Fancy ladies of the highest fashion sitting down at midnight to play loo in a St. James's-street club! And this was a hundred years ago. Surely the ladies who talk so much of female independence cannot know how much they have surrendered.

Here is another scene. You remember the Pantheon, gentle reader, as it was a few years ago-a congeries of stalls, where all manner of inutilities were sold. A dull place, in a dull neighbourhood, but excellently adapted for metamorphosis into wine-cellars. Ha! what think you it was a hundred years ago? Undoubtedly the finest and most complete thing ever seen in England. Such mixture of company never assembled before under the same roof. Lord Mansfield, Mrs. Baddeley, Lord Chief Baron Parker, Mrs. Abbington, Sir James Porter, Mademoiselle Heinell, Lords Hyde and Camden, with many other serious men, and most of the gay ladies in town, and ladies of the best rank and character; and, by appearance, some very low people. Louisa is thought very like Mrs. Baddeley. Gertrude and I had our doubts whether our characters might not suffer by walking with her.' Is not this naïve ? Ladies are gravely lectured by the Saturday Review for presuming to know who is the amber-tressed creature who drives Liliputian ponies in the Park; but excellent old Mrs. Harris takes her daughters to the Pantheon, where there were indiscriminate minuets and cotillons (alas, the waltz and polka were not invented!), and jests

with her son, secretary to the embassy at Berlin, on his sister's likeness to the naughty Mrs. Baddeley-a lady whose presence, by the way, did not seem to shock the judicial dignitaries who amused themselves in Oxford-street. Dulce est desipere in loco. We are a degenerate race, no doubt; but you won't see the lord chief baron in the Argyll Rooms in this century.

Here is another fantastic gaiety: In the evening we went to Lady Townshend's, who let in masques, and a great number she had. Lady Villiers was a sultana, as fine as any Eastern princess I ever redde of, a most immense profusion of diamonds all over her. Miss Dutton was a fine figure in the character of Almeda; there was a most jolly party of milkmaids with the May-day garland, Sir Watkin Williams Wynne carried the pail, and was a most excellent figure. Lady Williams Wynne, Lady Francis Wyndham, and another, danced round the pail in true milkmaid style.' Clearly this was a festive fashionable mode of celebrating the first of May. Can you imagine London-that London I mean which Theodore Hook described as bounded by Piccadilly on the north, the Haymarket on the east, Pall Mall on the south, and St. James's-street on the west -thronged with merry masqueraders on a joyous night of May, trooping into every house in gay disguises, rustic, romantic, oriental? Can it really be that this was the London of a century back, and that all that innocent merriment has perished and been lost in Lethe ? The Sir Watkin' of to-day will never be seen carrying a milkpail, depend on it. Mrs. Harris had left her daughter Gertrude at home, and she also let in masques. The first was a lady abbess, who sat and conversed with her in French half an hour before she could find out it was her old friend Lady Newdigate; soon after Sir Roger came in domino.' Allow me to suggest that this would be a glorious theme for the Newdigate prize poem.

I have said that gentlemen had not forgotten how to fight a duel in those days. Doubtless duelling was a barbarous expedient, and men often fought on frivolous grounds; but it certainly repressed impertinence, and furnished a means of reparation for injuries which the law is powerless to punish. Here are a few lines about a duel fought in 1773: Lords Townshend and Bellamont have entirely taken up all the conversation since we came to town; the duel was managed with great honour. They embraced before they fought, and each said, Long life to your lordship! Lord Bellamont (who was wounded) has recommended his seven natural children to Lord Townshend, in case he should die.' This would seem to have been rather a ridiculous and unnecessary encounter; still, there is something chivalrous in these two antagonists wishing each other long life before attempting to render the wish nugatory. A new dance. There is a new dance at the Festino, called the Fricasée. It is danced by George Hanger' (a guardsman and