om his father. The latter said that there was great excitement
in England over the events which had taken place in France, and
that his mother was rendered extremely anxious by the news of the
attacks upon chateaux, and the state of tumult and lawlessness
which prevailed. They thought he had better resign his situation
and return home.

Harry in his replies made light of the danger, and said that after
having been treated so kindly it would be most ungrateful of him
to break the engagement he had made for three years, and leave his
friends at the present moment. Indeed, he, like all around him,
was filled with the excitement of the time. In spite of the almost
universal confusion and disorder, life went on quietly and calmly
at the chateau. The establishment was greatly reduced, for few of
the tenants paid their rents; but the absence of ceremonial brought
the family closer together, and the marquis and his wife agreed that
they had never spent a happier time than the spring and summer of
1791.

The news of the failure of the king's attempt at flight on the
20th of June was a great shock to the marquis. "A king should never
fly," he said; "above all, he should never make an abortive attempt
at flight. It is lamentable that he should be so ill-advised."

At the end of September the elections to the Legislative Assembly as
it was now to be called, resulted in the return of men even more
extreme and violent than those whom they succeeded.

"We must go to Paris," the marquis said one day towards the end of
October. "The place for a French nobleman now is beside the king."

"And that of his wife beside the queen," the marquise said quietly.

"I cannot say no," the marquis replied. "I wish you could have stayed
with the children, but they need fear no trouble here. Ernest is
nearly seventeen, and may well begin, in my absence, to represent
me. I think we can leave the chateau without anxiety, but even were
it not so it would still be our duty to go."

"There is another thing I want to speak to you about before we
start," the marquise said. "Jeanne is no longer a child, although
we still regard her as one; she is fifteen, and she is graver
and more earnest than most girls of her age. It seems ridiculous
to think of such a thing, but it is clear that she has made this
English lad her hero. Do you not think it better that he should
go? It would be unfortunate in the extreme that she should get to
have any serious feel