s now!' What should you have all said
to that?"

"Detesting Byron's personal character, I should have said that the very
wonder was a piece of idle and meddling presumption," said Owen.

"And I should have answered that the Judge will do right," said Suton
reverently.

"Or if he wanted a text, `Who art thou that judgest another?'" said
Lillyston contemptuously.

"And I," said Julian, should have said,--

"Let feeble hands iniquitously just,
Rake up the relics of the sinful dust,
Let Ignorance mock the pang it cannot heal,
And Malice brand what Mercy would conceal;--
It matters not!"

"And I," said Kennedy, "should have been vehemently inclined to tweak
the man's nose."

"But what did _you_ say, Mr Admer?" asked Lillyston.

"I answered a fool according to his folly. I threw up my eyes and said,
`Ah, where, indeed! What a good thing it is that you and I, sir, are
not as that publican.'"

"I should think he skewered you with a glance, didn't he?" said Kennedy.

"No, he was going to _bore_ me with an argument, which I declined."

"But you've all cut the question: tell me now, supposing you had known
king David, should you have thought worse of him, should you have been
cool to him--in a word, should you have _cut_ him after his fall?"

"I think not--I mean, I shouldn't have _cut_ him," said Owen.

"And yet you would have treated so any ordinary friend."

"Not necessarily. But remember that the two best things happened to
David which could possibly happen to a man who has committed a crime."

"Namely?"

"Speedy detection," said Lillyston.

"And prompt punishment," added Julian; "but for these there's no knowing
what would have become of him."

Unsatisfactory as the discussion had been, yet those words rang
hauntingly in Kennedy's ears; he could not forget them. During all
those first days of happy travel they were with him; with him as they
strolled down the gay and lighted Boulevards of Paris; with him beside
the quaint fountains of Berne; and the green rushing of the Rhine at
Basle; with him amid the scent of pine-cones, and under the dark green
umbrage of forest boughs; with him when he caught his first glimpse of
the everlasting mountains, and plunged into the clear brightness of the
sapphire lake--the thought of speedy detection and prompt punishment.
It was no small pleasure to partake in Violet's happiness, and mark the
ever fresh delight that lent such a bright look to Cyril's f