so limpid, woods and curving banks reflected deep on its peaceful bosom.

"How Vance would enjoy this!" cried Lionel. "It would come into a
picture even better than the Thames."

"Vance? who is Vance?"

"The artist,--a great friend of mine. Surely, sir, you have heard of him
or seen his pictures!"

"Himself and his pictures are since my time. Days tread down days for
the recluse, and he forgets that celebrities rise with their suns, to
wane with their moons,

"'Truditur dies die,
Novaeque pergunt interire lunae'"

"All suns do not set; all moons do not wane!" cried Lionel, with
blunt enthusiasm. "When Horace speaks elsewhere of the Julian star, he
compares it to a moon--'inter ignes minores'--and surely Fame is not
among the orbs which 'pergunt interire,'--hasten on to perish!"

"I am glad to see that you retain your recollections of Horace,"
said Mr. Darrell, frigidly, and without continuing the allusion to
celebrities; "the most charming of all poets to a man of my years, and"
(he very dryly added) "the most useful for popular quotation to men at
any age."

Then sauntering forth carelessly, he descended the sloping turf, came to
the water-side, and threw himself at length on the grass: the wild thyme
which he crushed sent up its bruised fragrance. There, resting his face
on his hand, Darrell gazed along the water in abstracted silence. Lionel
felt that he was forgotten; but he was not hurt. By this time a strong
and admiring interest for his cousin had sprung up within his breast:
he would have found it difficult to explain why. But whosoever at that
moment could have seen Guy Darrell's musing countenance, or whosoever,
a few minutes before, could have heard the very sound of his voice,
sweetly, clearly full; each slow enunciation unaffectedly, mellowly
distinct,--making musical the homeliest; roughest word, would have
understood and shared the interest which Lionel could not explain. There
are living human faces, which, independently of mere physical beauty,
charm and enthrall us more than the most perfect lineaments which
Greek sculptor ever lent to a marble face; there are key-notes in the
thrilling human voice, simply uttered, which can haunt the heart, rouse
the passions, lull rampant multitudes, shake into dust the thrones of
guarded kings, and effect more wonders than ever yet have been wrought
by the most artful chorus or the deftest quill.

In a few minutes the swans from the farther