ore perfect meaning. The careless sergeant smiled
within himself, and probably too the devil smiled from a loop-hole in
Tophet, for the moment was the turning-point of a career. Her tone
and mien signified beyond mistake that the seed which was to lift the
foundation had taken root in the chink: the remainder was a mere
question of time and natural changes.

"There the truth comes out!" said the soldier, in reply. "Never tell
me that a young lady can live in a buzz of admiration without knowing
something about it. Ah, well, Miss Everdene, you are--pardon my
blunt way--you are rather an injury to our race than otherwise."

"How--indeed?" she said, opening her eyes.

"Oh, it is true enough. I may as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb
(an old country saying, not of much account, but it will do for a
rough soldier), and so I will speak my mind, regardless of your
pleasure, and without hoping or intending to get your pardon. Why,
Miss Everdene, it is in this manner that your good looks may do more
harm than good in the world." The sergeant looked down the mead in
critical abstraction. "Probably some one man on an average falls in
love with each ordinary woman. She can marry him: he is content,
and leads a useful life. Such women as you a hundred men always
covet--your eyes will bewitch scores on scores into an unavailing
fancy for you--you can only marry one of that many. Out of these
say twenty will endeavour to drown the bitterness of despised love
in drink; twenty more will mope away their lives without a wish or
attempt to make a mark in he world, because they have no ambition
apart from their attachment to you; twenty more--the susceptible
person myself possibly among them--will be always draggling after
you, getting where they may just see you, doing desperate things.
Men are such constant fools! The rest may try to get over their
passion with more or less success. But all these men will be
saddened. And not only those ninety-nine men, but the ninety-nine
women they might have married are saddened with them. There's my
tale. That's why I say that a woman so charming as yourself, Miss
Everdene, is hardly a blessing to her race."

The handsome sergeant's features were during this speech as rigid and
stern as John Knox's in addressing his gay young queen.

Seeing she made no reply, he said, "Do you read French?"

"No; I began, but when I got to the verbs, father died," she said
simply.

"I do--whe