uality of the food--though that must have a great influence on
mind and character. But to sit for an hour or two each evening in
quiet, orderly enjoyment, with graceful things about one, talking of
whatever is pleasant--how it civilises! Until three months ago I never
dined in my life, and I know well what a change it has made in me."

"I never dined till this evening," said Eve.

"Never? This is the first time you have been at a restaurant?"

"For dinner--yes."

Hilliard heard the avowal with surprise and delight. After all, there
could not have been much intimacy between her and the man she met at
the Exhibition.

"When I go back to slavery," he continued, "I shall bear it more
philosophically. It was making me a brute, but I think there'll be no
more danger of that. The memory of civilisation will abide with me. I
shall remind myself that I was once a free man, and that will support
me."

Eve regarded him with curiosity.

"Is there no choice?" she asked. "While you have money, couldn't you
find some better way of earning a living?"

"I have given it a thought now and then, but it's very doubtful.
There's only one thing at which I might have done well, and that's
architecture. From studying it just for my own pleasure, I believe I
know more about architecture than most men who are not in the
profession; but it would take a long time before I could earn money by
it. I could prepare myself to be an architectural draughtsman, no
doubt, and might do as well that way as drawing machinery. But----"

"Then why don't you go to work! It would save you from living in
hideous places."

"After all, does it matter much? If I had anything else to gain.
Suppose I had any hope of marriage, for instance----"

He said it playfully. Eve turned her eyes away, but gave no other sign
of self-consciousness.

"I have no such hope. I have seen too much of marriage in poverty."

"So have I," said his companion, with quiet emphasis.

"And when a man's absolutely sure that he will never have an income of
more than a hundred and fifty pounds----"

"It's a crime if he asks a woman to share it," Eve added coldly.

"I agree with you. It's well to understand each other on that
point.--Talking of architecture, I bought a grand book this afternoon."

He described the purchase, and mentioned what it cost.

"But at that rate," said Eve, "your days of slavery will come again
very soon."

"Oh! it's so rarely that I spend a large sum