quarrel; and there is the
new anthem of Spohr's at the Octagon this morning. You will be wanted."

"Well, what if I am?" Alexander said. "Surely, Caroline, the life or
death of a friend is of more importance than an anthem?"

"You do not know that it is life or death; you are conjecturing. Yes,
William, I am ready!"

This was characteristic of Caroline Herschel. It was not really that she
had no human sympathies or affections; on the contrary, her love for her
brother was absorbing, and she had but one aim--to soar with him to the
unexplored regions of space; and to effect this, the business in hand,
whether it was music, or mixing loam for the mould of the new tube, or
in giving a lesson in singing, or in singing herself at a concert, was
paramount with her. Such characters, persistent, and with single aims,
are often misunderstood by natures like Alexander Herschel's, who love
to skim the surface, and pass from one thing to another, as their mood
changes.

"You take it mighty coolly," he said, "that the life of a man we call
our friend is in peril. I confess I am not so hardened."

And then he closed the door with a bang, and ran downstairs.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE BITTER END.

Meanwhile the lonely woman, shrouded in her long cloak, pursued her way.
She missed it again and again, and was forced to inquire if she was
right, first of a countryman she met, and once at a cottage at Widcombe
of a woman who was standing at the door with a lanthorn in her hand.

"Two miles further," she said. "What are you going there for, pray, if I
may be so bold?"

"On an errand of life or death," Griselda said, the words escaping her
lips almost unawares.

"If that's it, and a duel is to be fought, it most like is death to one
of 'em. I am watching for my husband; he has never come home, and I fear
something has happened. He is often in liquor, and may have stumbled
into the quarry. I call _mine_ real troubles, I do. What do the gentry
want with stabbing one another to the heart about paltry quarrels? Why,
the French lord was killed out on Claverton Down by Count Rice a few
months ago, and all about a trumpery pack of cards--a pack of lies, more
like! I've no patience with folks who quarrel with no reason. You look
very wan, my dear," the woman said, as Griselda turned away. "I can give
you a cup of milk."

But Griselda shook her head. To eat or drink at that moment was
impossible to her.

"Tell me," she asked, "h