erious occupation made good progress in shaking
off the dreary melancholy which enveloped him even now. Distracted and
weakened in his beliefs by his recent experiences, he decided that he
could not for a time worthily fill the office of a minister of religion,
and applied for the mastership of a school. Some introductions, given
him before starting, were useful now, and he soon became known as a
respectable scholar and gentleman to the trustees of one of the colleges.
This ultimately led to his retirement from the school and installation in
the college as Professor of rhetoric and oratory.

Here and thus he lived on, exerting himself solely because of a
conscientious determination to do his duty. He passed his winter
evenings in turning sonnets and elegies, often giving his thoughts voice
in 'Lines to an Unfortunate Lady,' while his summer leisure at the same
hour would be spent in watching the lengthening shadows from his window,
and fancifully comparing them with the shades of his own life. If he
walked, he mentally inquired which was the eastern quarter of the
landscape, and thought of two thousand miles of water that way, and of
what was beyond it. In a word he was at all spare times dreaming of her
who was only a memory to him, and would probably never be more.

Nine years passed by, and under their wear and tear Alwyn Hill's face
lost a great many of the attractive characteristics which had formerly
distinguished it. He was kind to his pupils and affable to all who came
in contact with him; but the kernel of his life, his secret, was kept as
snugly shut up as though he had been dumb. In talking to his
acquaintances of England and his life there, he omitted the episode of
Batton Castle and Emmeline as if it had no existence in his calendar at
all. Though of towering importance to himself, it had filled but a short
and small fragment of time, an ephemeral season which would have been
wellnigh imperceptible, even to him, at this distance, but for the
incident it enshrined.

One day, at this date, when cursorily glancing over an old English
newspaper, he observed a paragraph which, short as it was, contained for
him whole tomes of thrilling information--rung with more passion-stirring
rhythm than the collected cantos of all the poets. It was an
announcement of the death of the Duke of Hamptonshire, leaving behind him
a widow, but no children.

The current of Alwyn's thoughts now completely changed. On lo