inter's studio. . . . The next sejour I had
with him began in sight of the Demawend. Sabina, perhaps you might
like to relate to Mr. Smith that interview, and the circumstances
under which you made your first sketch of that magnificent and
little-known volcano?'

Sabina blushed again--this time scarlet; and, to Lancelot's
astonishment, pulled off her slipper, and brandishing it daintily,
uttered some unintelligible threat, in an Oriental language, at the
laughing Claude.

'Why, you must have been in the East?'

'Why not! Do you think that figure and that walk were picked up in
stay-ridden, toe-pinching England? . . . Ay, in the East; and why
not elsewhere? Do you think I got my knowledge of the human figure
from the live-model in the Royal Academy?'

'I certainly have always had my doubts of it. You are the only man
I know who can paint muscle in motion.'

'Because I am almost the only man in England who has ever seen it.
Artists should go to the Cannibal Islands for that. . . . J'ai fait
le grand tour. I should not wonder if the prophet made you take
it.'

'That would be very much as I chose.'

'Or otherwise.'

'What do you mean?'

'That if he wills you to go, I defy you to stay. Eh, Sabina!'

'Well, you are a very mysterious pair,--and a very charming one.'

'So we think ourselves--as to the charmingness. . . . and as for the
mystery . . . "Omnia exeunt in mysterium," says somebody, somewhere-
-or if he don't, ought to, seeing that it is so. You will be a
mystery some day, and a myth, and a thousand years hence pious old
ladies will be pulling caps as to whether you were a saint or a
devil, and whether you did really work miracles or not, as
corroborations of your ex-supra-lunar illumination on social
questions. . . . Yes . . . you will have to submit, and see Bogy,
and enter the Eleusinian mysteries. Eh, Sabina?'

'My dear Claude, what between the Burgundy and your usual
foolishness, you seem very much inclined to divulge the Eleusinian
mysteries.'

'I can't well do that, my beauty, seeing that, if you recollect, we
were both turned back at the vestibule, for a pair of naughty
children as we are.'

'Do be quiet! and let me enjoy, for once, my woman's right to the
last word!'

And in this hopeful state of mystification, Lancelot went home, and
dreamt of Argemone.

His uncle would, and, indeed, as it seemed, could, give him very
little information on the