ng the ring
tightly in her hand.

"Will you tell us the history?" she asked in a low tone.

The man hesitated.

"If I do so," he said doubtfully, "will you promise to keep it
absolutely secret?"

"Yes."

"Well, then, I have told it to no one yet, but I will tell it to you.
Many years ago I was a chemist, and among my customers was Count
Leonardo di Marioni. His history was a very sad one, as doubtless you
may have heard. When he was quite a young man he was arrested on some
political charge, and imprisoned for five-and-twenty years--a cruel
time. Well, scarcely more than twelve months ago he came to me here, so
altered that I found it hard indeed to recognize him. Poor old
gentleman, when he had talked for a while, I felt quite sure that his
long confinement had affected his mind, and his errand with me made me
sure of it. He came to buy a celebrated poison which I used at one time
to be secretly noted for, and I could tell from his manner that he
wanted it for some fatal use. Well, I thought at first of refusing it
altogether, but what was the use of that? Some one else would have sold
him an equally powerful poison, and the mischief would be done all the
same. So, after a little consideration, I made up quite an innocent
powder, which might cause a little momentary faintness, but which could
do no further harm, and I gave it to him as the real thing. I couldn't
take money for doing a thing like that, so he pressed this ring upon me.
You see, it really has a history."

Lord Lumley took his wife's hand and pressed it tenderly. In the deep
gloom of the shop the curio dealer could not see the tears which
glistened in her dark eyes.

"We will have the ring!" Lord Lumley said, taking a note from his
pocket-book and handing it across the counter.

The man held it up to the light.

"One hundred pounds," he remarked. "I shall owe your lordship ninety."

Lord Lumley shook his head.

"No, Signor Paschuli, you owe me nothing; it is I who owe you a wife.
Come, Margharita, let us get out into the sunshine again."

And Signor Paschuli kept the note. But he has come to the conclusion
that all Englishmen traveling on their honeymoon are mad.

THE GREAT AWAKENING

Sir Powers Fiske, though far from being a sybarite, possessed a
fundamental but crudely developed love of the beautiful. Before all
things with him came his devotion to science and scientific
investigation. But for his unexpected accession to the ti