ring in the canny siller as none of the
Fenwicks had done in the palmiest days of the moss-trooping.

Well I knew when I set out that I had my work before me, and that I
should earn my two hundred pounds a year or all were done. For I had but
a couple of years more than my pupil to boast myself upon; and he,
having grown up on the Continent, chiefly in Latin cities and German
watering-places, was vastly superior to me in the knowledge which comes
not easily to the lads from the moors, who at all times know better how
to loup a moss-hag than how to make a courtly bow.

Yet for all that I did not mean to be far behind any Border Fenwick when
it came to making bows. Nor, as it happened, was I when all was done.
This confidence was partly owing to full feeding on fine porridge and
braxy, but more to that inbred belief of Galloway in itself which the
ill-affected and envious nominate its conceit.

Henry Fenwick was abiding in this city of Vico Averso, as I had been
informed by his uncle and guardian, for the baths. He had been advised
of my coming, and, like the kindly lad that he proved to be, I found him
waiting for me when the diligence arrived.

We met with few words on either side, but I think with instant hearty
liking. My pupil was tall and dark, his hair a little long, yet not
falling to his shoulders--somewhat feminine in type of feature and
Italianate in complexion. But the mouth shewed breeding, the eyes
kindliness; and, after all, these are the main features. I was
especially glad to find myself taller than he by a span of inches.

He took me to the hotel where a room had been ordered for me--not one of
the common Italian inns, but a hotel built for the accommodation of
foreigners. As we went up the steps, we passed a lady sitting in the
shade with a book. She was a large fair woman, with sleepy eyes and a
mane of bronzed gold hair. She had been looking at us as we came, I will
be bound; but when we passed she became absorbed and unconscious upon
her book.

As Henry raised his hat she bowed slightly to him, lifting at the same
time her heavy eyelids and glancing at me. I had once seen that look
before--in a spectacle of wild beasts when I happened to stand close to
a drowsing tigress that twitched an eyelid and flashed a yellow eye at
me. In that eye-shot on the verandah of the hotel in Vico Averso, the
crossing of glances was like a challenge, and thrilled me as when one is
called to fight. I think we hate