I shall
write instructions for tracing them at my expense--merely announcing
that an Unknown Friend desires to be of service to the General's
family."

This appeared to me to be a most imprudent thing to do. I said so
plainly--and quite in vain. With his customary impetuosity, he wrote the
letter at once, and sent it to the post that night.

X.

ON the question of submitting himself to medical advice (which I
now earnestly pressed upon him), Romayne was disposed to be equally
unreasonable. But in this case, events declared themselves in my favor.

Lady Berrick's last reserves of strength had given way. She had been
brought to London in a dying state while we were at Vange Abbey. Romayne
was summoned to his aunt's bedside on the third day of our residence at
the hotel, and was present at her death. The impression produced on his
mind roused the better part of his nature. He was more distrustful of
himself, more accessible to persuasion than usual. In this gentler frame
of mind he received a welcome visit from an old friend, to whom he was
sincerely attached. The visit--of no great importance in itself--led,
as I have since been informed, to very serious events in Romayne's later
life. For this reason, I briefly relate what took place within my own
healing.

Lord Loring--well known in society as the head of an old English
Catholic family, and the possessor of a magnificent gallery of
pictures--was distressed by the change for the worse which he perceived
in Romayne when he called at the hotel. I was present when they met, and
rose to leave the room, feeling that the two friends might perhaps be
embarrassed by the presence of a third person. Romayne called me back.
"Lord Loring ought to know what has happened to me," he said. "I have no
heart to speak of it myself. Tell him everything, and if he agrees with
you, I will submit to see the doctors." With those words he left us
together.

It is almost needless to say that Lord Loring did agree with me. He
was himself disposed to think that the moral remedy, in Romayne's case,
might prove to be the best remedy.

"With submission to what the doctors may decide," his lordship said,
"the right thing to do, in my opinion, is to divert our friend's mind
from himself. I see a plain necessity for making a complete change in
the solitary life that he has been leading for years past. Why shouldn't
he marry? A woman's influence, by merely giving a new turn to his
thoughts, migh