had not seen him, you may be sure. He knew that such people would think
less of Georgy for having a seedy old father out at elbows, so he was
willing to keep in the background. This very morning, however, Georgy
had come out for a rendezvous in a secluded corner of the Common, and
had taken rare delight in the assignation and pretended he was her lover
whom she was forced to meet in secret.
"I dare say she has tripped out before to meet somebody," said Harry,
who was always cynical regarding women, but especially severe where
Georgy was concerned. "Girls practise those wiles on fathers and
brothers, that they may do the thing neatly when a lover turns up."
"Nonsense! For the matter of that, it has sometimes seemed a little hard
upon my girl that, although she is engaged to the best fellow in the
world, she should have no chance to win lovers from society at large.
Not but that I am glad that her future is so secure--a most fortunate
match for her. I am proud when I think of it."
Well he might be proud. It is something out of the course of every-day
events for a girl to possess the love of a man like Jack, whose nature
combined the strongest masculine qualities with the tenderness and
faithfulness of a woman. Of a woman? Strange how we use phrases which
have outworn their meaning! Jack's tenderness and faithfulness were
altogether without parallel.
ELLEN W. OLNEY.
[TO BE CONTINUED.]
PERSONAL SKETCHES OF SOME FRENCH LITTERATEURS.
Paris, any Frenchman will tell you, is the capital of intellect; and
though this is but one of a hundred things equally flattering to their
country which all Frenchmen believe, yet it happens to be true. In some
societies it is social rank, in others wealth and fine houses, in
others, still, capacity to render service to the state, which makes old
men courted and opens doors to the novice. But in Paris it is brains. If
you have written a book or painted a picture or discovered a scientific
theory, you have at once a reserved seat, as it were, in the social
world, and nobody thinks of asking who your father was, or where you
live, or what your income may be. With the literary society the
political is so closely allied that the two may be said to coincide.
There are coteries of course, but there are also neutral grounds on
which members of all sets meet in peace and separate in harmony; and
especially since the Republic has become firmly established the barriers
based
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