n the enterprise. He might
expose himself, unseasoned, to the poison of the Roman air, which in
November lay, notoriously, much in wait. Fortune, however, favours the
brave; and this adventurer, who took three grains of quinine a day, had
at the end of a month no cause to deplore his temerity. He had made to
a certain extent good use of his time; he had devoted it in vain
to finding a flaw in Pansy Osmond's composition. She was admirably
finished; she had had the last touch; she was really a consummate piece.
He thought of her in amorous meditation a good deal as he might have
thought of a Dresden-china shepherdess. Miss Osmond, indeed, in the
bloom of her juvenility, had a hint of the rococo which Rosier, whose
taste was predominantly for that manner, could not fail to appreciate.
That he esteemed the productions of comparatively frivolous periods
would have been apparent from the attention he bestowed upon Madame
Merle's drawing-room, which, although furnished with specimens of every
style, was especially rich in articles of the last two centuries. He
had immediately put a glass into one eye and looked round; and then "By
Jove, she has some jolly good things!" he had yearningly murmured. The
room was small and densely filled with furniture; it gave an impression
of faded silk and little statuettes which might totter if one moved.
Rosier got up and wandered about with his careful tread, bending over
the tables charged with knick-knacks and the cushions embossed with
princely arms. When Madame Merle came in she found him standing before
the fireplace with his nose very close to the great lace flounce
attached to the damask cover of the mantel. He had lifted it delicately,
as if he were smelling it.

"It's old Venetian," she said; "it's rather good."

"It's too good for this; you ought to wear it."

"They tell me you have some better in Paris, in the same situation."

"Ah, but I can't wear mine," smiled the visitor.

"I don't see why you shouldn't! I've better lace than that to wear."

His eyes wandered, lingeringly, round the room again. "You've some very
good things."

"Yes, but I hate them."

"Do you want to get rid of them?" the young man quickly asked.

"No, it's good to have something to hate: one works it off!"

"I love my things," said Mr. Rosier as he sat there flushed with all his
recognitions. "But it's not about them, nor about yours, that I came
to talk to you." He paused a moment and then, with g