f which I knew so intimately. And just as I, if set down
without warning in the middle of the Rocky Mountains, would have been
perfectly at home, so Selina, if a genie had dropped her suddenly on
Portsmouth Hard, could have given points to most of its frequenters.
From the days of Blake down to the death of Nelson (she never
condescended further) Selina had taken spiritual part in every notable
engagement of the British Navy; and even in the dark days when she had
to pick up skirts and flee, chased by an ungallant De Ruyter or Van
Tromp, she was yet cheerful in the consciousness that ere long she would
be gleefully hammering the fleets of the world, in the glorious times
to follow. When that golden period arrived, Selina was busy indeed; and,
while loving best to stand where the splinters were flying the thickest.
she was also a careful and critical student of seamanship and of
manoeuvre. She knew the order in which the great line-of-battle ships
moved into action, the vessels they respectively engaged, the moment
when each let go its anchor, and which of them had a spring on its cable
(while not understanding the phrase, she carefully noted the fact);
and she habitually went into an engagement on the quarter-deck of the
gallant ship that reserved its fire the longest.

At the time of Selina's weird seizure I was unfortunately away from
home, on a loathsome visit to an aunt; and my account is therefore
feebly compounded from hearsay. It was an absence I never ceased to
regret--scoring it up, with a sense of injury, against the aunt. There
was a splendid uselessness about the whole performance that specially
appealed to my artistic sense. That it should have been Selina, too,
who should break out this way--Selina, who had just become a regular
subscriber to the "Young Ladies' Journal," and who allowed herself to
be taken out to strange teas with an air of resignation palpably
assumed--this was a special joy, and served to remind me that much of
this dreaded convention that was creeping over us might be, after
all, only veneer. Edward also was absent, getting licked into shape at
school; but to him the loss was nothing. With his stern practical bent
he wouldn't have seen any sense in it--to recall one of his favourite
expressions. To Harold, however, for whom the gods had always cherished
a special tenderness, it was granted, not only to witness, but also,
priestlike, to feed the sacred fire itself. And if at the time he p