able object, the goodness of his intentions comforts
him for a failure in success, whereas your selfishly ambitious man has
no consolation in his defeats; he is humbled by the external world, and
has no inner world to apply to for consolation."

"Oh, man!" said Godolphin, almost bitterly, "how dost thou eternally
deceive thyself! Here is the thirst for power, and it calls itself the
love of mankind!"

"Believe me," said Radclyffe, so earnestly, and with so deep a meaning
in his grave, bright eye, that Godolphin was staggered from his
scepticism;--"believe me, they may be distinct passions, and yet can be
united."

CHAPTER LIII.

FANNY BEHIND THE SCENES.--REMINISCENCES OF YOUTH.--THE UNIVERSALITY OF
TRICK.--THE SUPPER AT FANNY MILLINGER'S.--TALK ON A THOUSAND MATTERS,
EQUALLY LIGHT AND TRUE.--FANNY'S SONG.

The play was Pizarro, and Fanny Millinger acted Cora, Godolphin and
Radclyffe went behind the scenes.

"Ah!" said Fanny, as she stood in her white Peruvian dress, waiting
her turn to re-enter the stage,--"ah, Godolphin! this reminds me of old
times. How many years have passed since you used to take such pleasure
in this mimic life! Well do I remember your musing eye and thoughtful
brow bent kindly on me from the stage-box yonder: and do you recollect
how prettily you used to moralise on the deserted scenes when the play
was over? And you sometimes waited on these very boards to escort me
home. Those times have changed. Heigh-ho!"

"Ay, Fanny, we have passed through new worlds of feeling since then.
Could life be to us now what it was at that time, we might love each
other anew: but tell me, Fanny, has not the experience of life made
you a wiser woman? Do you not seek more to enjoy the present--to pluck
Tirne's fruit on the bough, ere yet the ripeness is gone? I do. I
dreamed away my youth--I strive to enjoy my manhood."

"Then," said Fanny, with that quickness with which, in matters of the
heart, women beat all our philosophy--"then I can prophesy that, since
we parted, you have loved or lost some one. Regret, which converts
the active mind into the dreaming temper, makes the dreamer hurry into
activity, whether of business or of pleasure."

"Right," said Radclyffe, as a shade darkened his stern brow.

"Right," said Godolphin thoughtfully, and Lucille's image smote his
heart like an avenging conscience. "Right," repeated he, turning aside
and soliloquising; "and those words from an idle tongue have t