s vitality of that rarest
of all rare gifts in highly-civilized circles,--perfect health; that
health which is in itself the most exquisite luxury; which, finding
happiness in the mere sense of existence, diffuses round it, like an
atmosphere, the harmless hilarity of its bright animal being. Health,
to the utmost perfection, is seldom known after childhood; health to the
utmost cannot be enjoyed by those who overwork the brain, or admit the
sure wear and tear of the passions. The creature I had just seen gave
me the notion of youth in the golden age of the poets,--the youth of the
careless Arcadian, before nymph or shepherdess had vexed his heart with
a sigh.

CHAPTER XXIV.

The house I occupied at L---- was a quaint, old-fashioned building, a
corner-house. One side, in which was the front entrance, looked upon
a street which, as there were no shops in it, and it was no direct
thoroughfare to the busy centres of the town, was always quiet, and
at some hours of the day almost deserted. The other side of the house
fronted a lane; opposite to it was the long and high wall of the garden
to a Young Ladies' Boarding-school. My stables adjoined the house,
abutting on a row of smaller buildings, with little gardens before them,
chiefly occupied by mercantile clerks and retired tradesmen. By the lane
there was a short and ready access both to the high turnpike-road, and
to some pleasant walks through green meadows and along the banks of a
river.

This house I had inhabited since my arrival at L----, and it had to
me so many attractions, in a situation sufficiently central to be
convenient for patients, and yet free from noise, and favourable to
ready outlet into the country for such foot or horse exercise as my
professional avocations would allow me to carve for myself out of what
the Latin poet calls the "solid day," that I had refused to change it
for one better suited to my increased income; but it was not a house
which Mrs. Ashleigh would have liked for Lilian. The main objection to
it in the eyes of the "genteel" was, that it had formerly belonged to a
member of the healing profession who united the shop of an apothecary
to the diploma of a surgeon; but that shop had given the house a special
attraction to me; for it had been built out on the side of the house
which fronted the lane, occupying the greater portion of a small gravel
court, fenced from the road by a low iron palisade, and separated
from the body of