an honour,--it was something for him to talk of to Legard. Nevertheless,
the shyness got the better of the vanity. He excused himself; he feared
he was engaged to take down Legard.

Lumley smiled, and changed the conversation; and so agreeable did he
make himself, that when the party broke up, and Lumley had just shaken
hands with his host, Doltimore came to him, and said in a little
confusion,--

"I think I can put off Legard--if--if you--"

"That's delightful! What time shall we start?--need not get down much
before dinner--one o'clock?"

"Oh, yes! not too long before dinner; one o'clock will be a little too
early."

"Two then. Where are you staying?"

"At Fenton's."

"I will call for you. Good-night! I long to see Thunderer!"

CHAPTER VI.

LA sante de l'ame n'est pas plus assuree que celle du corps;
et quoique l'on paraisse eloigne des passions, on n'est pas
moins en danger de s'y laisser emporter que de tomber malade
quand on se porte bien.*--LA ROCHEFOUCAULD.

* "The health of the soul is not more sure than that of the
body; and although we may appear free from passions, there
is not the less danger of their attack than of falling sick
at the moment we are well."

IN spite of the efforts of Maltravers to shun all occasions of meeting
Evelyn, they were necessarily sometimes thrown together in the round
of provincial hospitalities; and certainly, if either Mr. Merton
or Caroline (the shrewder observer of the two) had ever formed any
suspicion that Evelyn had made a conquest of Maltravers, his manner at
such times effectually removed it.

Maltravers was a man to feel deeply, but no longer a boy to yield to
every tempting impulse. I have said that FORTITUDE was his favourite
virtue, but fortitude is the virtue of great and rare occasions; there
was another, equally hard-favoured and unshowy, which he took as the
staple of active and every-day duties, and that virtue was JUSTICE. Now,
in earlier life, he had been enamoured of the conventional Florimel that
we call HONOUR,--a shifting and shadowy phantom, that is but the reflex
of the opinion of the time and clime. But justice has in it something
permanent and solid; and out of justice arises the real not the false
honour.

"Honour!" said Maltravers,--"honour is to justice as the flower to the
plant,--its efflorescence, its bloom, its consummation! But honour
that does not spring from justice is but a piece of painted rag, an