ng up at the stars as I tramped homeward, I could but remember an
old epigram:--

Were you the earth, dear love, and I the skies,
My love should shine on you like to the sun,
And look upon you with ten thousand eyes,
Till heaven wax'd blind, and till the world were done.

I had ample leisure for reflection during that long night-walk, and
found myself becoming a perfect Young--Hervey--Sturm--what you will, in
the way of meditation. I could not choose but wonder at myself when I
looked back to this time last year, and remembered my idle evenings in
third-rate _cafes_, on the _rive gauche_, playing dominoes, talking the
foul slang of Parisian bohemia, and poisoning my system with
adulterated absinthe. And now I feast upon sweet cakes and honey, and
think it paradisiac enjoyment to play whist--for love--in a farm-house
parlour. I am younger by ten years than I was twelve months ago.

Ah, let me thank God, who has sent me my redemption.

I lifted my hat, and pronounced the thanksgiving softly under that
tranquil sky. I was almost ashamed to hear the sound of my own voice. I
was like some shy child who for the first time speaks his father's name.

CHAPTER V.

TOO FAIR TO LAST.

In my confidences with my dear girl I had told her neither the nature
of my mission in Yorkshire, nor the fact that I was bound to leave
Huxter's Cross immediately upon an exploring expedition to nowhere in
particular, in search of the archives of the Meynells. How could I
bring myself to tell her that I must leave her?--how much less could I
bring myself to do it?

Rendered desperately unmindful of the universe by reason of my
all-absorbing happiness, I determined on giving myself a holiday
boldly, in defiance of Sheldon and the Sheldonian interests.

"Am I a bounden slave?" I asked myself, "that I should go here or there
at any man's bidding, for the pitiful stipend of twenty shillings a
week?"

It is to be observed that the rate of hire makes all the difference in
these cases; and while it is ignominious for a lawyer's clerk to hasten
to and fro in the earning of his weekly wage, it is in no way
dishonourable for the minister of state to obey the call of his chief,
and hurry hither and thither in abnegation of all his own
predilections, and to the aggravation of his chronic gout.

I wrote to my Sheldon, and told him that I had met with friends in the
neighbourhood of Huxter's Cross, and that I intended to g