untenance that suggested a worried knot;
and mischievously she said: 'Do you take to Delphica?'

He replied, with an evident sincerity, 'I cannot say I do.'

Had Mr. Semhians been modelled on him?

'One bets on the German, of course--with Colney Durance,' Victor said to
Dr. Themison, leading him over the grounds of Lakelands.

'In any case, the author teaches us to feel an interest in the rivals. I
want to know what comes of it,' said the doctor.

'There's a good opportunity, one sees. But, mark me, it will all end in
satire upon poor Old England. According to Colney, we excel in nothing.'

'I do not think there is a country that could offer the entertainment
for which I am indebted to you to-day.'

'Ah, my friend, and you like their voices? The contralto?'

'Exquisite.'

Dr. Themison had not spoken the name of Radnor.

'Shall we see you at our next Concert-evening in town?' said Victor;
and hearing 'the privilege' mentioned, his sharp bright gaze cleared to
limpid. 'You have seen how it stands with us here!' At once he related
what indeed Dr. Themison had begun speculatively to think might be the
case.

Mrs. Burman Radnor had dropped words touching a husband, and of her
desire to communicate with him, in the event of her being given over to
the surgeons: she had said, that her husband was a greatly gifted
man; setting her head in a compassionate swing. This revelation of the
husband soon after, was filling. And this Mr. Radnor's comrade's manner
of it, was winning: a not too self-justifying tone; not void of feeling
for the elder woman; with a manly eulogy of the younger, who had flung
away the world for him and borne him their one dear child. Victor took
the blame wholly upon himself. 'It is right that you should know,' he
said to the doctor's thoughtful posture; and he stressed the blame;
and a flame shot across his eyeballs. He brought home to his hearer the
hurricane of a man he was in the passion: indicating the subjection
of such a temperament as this Victor Radnor's to trials of the moral
restraints beyond his human power.

Dr. Themison said: 'Would you--we postpone that as long as we can: but
supposing the poor lady...?'

Victor broke in: 'I see her wish: I will.'

The clash of his answer rang beside Dr. Themison's faltering query.

We are grateful when spared the conclusion of a sentence born to
stammer. If for that only, the doctor pressed Victor's hand warmly.

'I may, then, convey some fo