Her eyes were by no means glamoured as to Gower's character. Swift and straight her womanly understanding had spelled it from the first. She knew that he had not a wholly noble nature, that his love for herself was its chief, nay, its only nobility; but this fact made her only proud and joyful. The other love, the love she had trampled under foot and cast from her, was linked with perfections, subdued by other emotions, subjected to other duties, and therefore she despised it.

They were intensely happy, or rather they cultivated the faculty of enjoyment to the utmost. How could a cloud of ennui arise above their horizon when Emilia's moods were more changeful than the clouds, and Harold worshipped every one of them.

Sometimes she would take his rough head between her little palms and shrug her shoulders with an affectation of horror.

"How ugly you are, my darling, and yet I should go mad if you ceased to care for me. What a tawny skin, what a shaggy beard, what heavy, thundering brows. You are ugly, arn't you, Harold ?"

Another time she would quarrel with him in this wise:

"Harold, you shouldn't play the by-points and speak as if we two were good people. You know how I hate it."

One day she said :

"Don't flatter yourself, Harold, that we are to live in a luxe de miel all the days of our life. We shall always love each other to the end of the chapter, but as we are not of the angels it is only fair to expect storms and squabbles now and then."

Whereupon Harold answered that he hated storms and squabbles, and that he felt sure it would be a luxe de miel all the days of their lives. "You are such an unreasonable little thing," he added, "you grow discontented at finding yourself so happy."

"No," she said, "it is you who are unreasonable. You get absorbed over your painting, and forget that there is anything else in the world-excepting a foolish little Emilia."

"There is nothing else in my world," he said, attempting to draw her to him.

"Nonsense. Why should we expect to be better treated by Providence than our betters ? We cannot always live out of the world, you know, Harold, and we must not expect people to pet us much when they know all." "Emilia !

"Harold, listen, murder will out. If we settled ourselves at Timbuctoo, we should find somebody there whose face would preach penitence to us. I know what it is to have a conscience, if you don't."

"But, my dearest, why talk of disagreeable possibilities, impossibilities I might say? We are not going to settle at Timbuctoo, certainly, but we purpose a deliciously vagrant life of travel, and with such, what preachings can interfere ? "

He went on to paint a rainbow-coloured future, and she listened much as children listen to fairy tales. When he had done she opened her large wonderful eyes with a mixed expression of joy and incredulity.

"And if we fall in with cross-grained old kites who fly at the poor little birdie, will you drive them off and be very kind?"

"I cannot forget that I was a woman once, and that I am something lower now. Oh! Harold, tell me again and again that you love me better for having so sinned. I never wholly believe it ? "

He grew very grave and gentle then, and kneeling beside her poured out as burning a love story as ever lady listened to. Soon Emilia's tears ceased to flow, the flush died away from her cheeks, and she clung to him, caressed and caressing.

"You so seldom take things seriously," he said, "or I should before have proved to you how much better and loftier you have made my life

"Loftier. Oh, Harold!

"Aye, loftier. Till I knew you I doubted and disputed about everything. What I painted was worth nothing, because I held myself to be worth nothing. Now I am doing good work, and if you understood art in the least degree you would be proud to feel how much I owe you."

He was so grave that she felt bound to be gay.

"And now let us run out and play. I hate serious talk, I don't want to be lectured to upon art. If you painted the best pictures ever seen in the world I shouldn't love you one whit more, and perhaps you'd grow conceited and run away.”

The artist had spoken truly. Strange as it may seem, the very passion by which his moral nature was abased, elevated and enlarged his artistic faculty. Nothing would

have made him capable of great things; but the consummation of a happy love was developing his capabilities to the utmost. He no longer copied Nature coldly, but he interpreted her, bringing to the work thoughts ever changeful and ever tender, fancies fairer and freer than the dreams of poets. No wonder that he said to the day, Stay, for thou art fair." No wonder that he took little discredit to himself, rather the reverse, for having done evil that good might come, and harvested his golden sheaves joyfully, never counting how many were left on the field.

On the eve of their departure from the caravansera a little cavalcade arrived from Algiers, bound to the military station of Teniet-el-Haad. The party consisted of an elderly French officer, his pretty young wife, their three children, a French nurse, and an Arab man-servant of all work. There being only two rooms at the disposal of the hostess, she explained that the only alternative was to divide her guests into squadrons, the ladies occupying one, the men the other. Emilia consented to this arrangement with no very good grace; she hated being in the room with babies at night, she said, they were always either hungry, or cutting teeth, or making themselves disagreeable; her illhumour soon melted, however, under the influence of the little French lady, Madame Challamel. Emilia was one of those women who love pretty eyes, pretty toilettes, and pretty ways in another without any jealousy whatever, and Madame Challamel possessed, in addition to these attractions, a naïveté of character perfectly charming. She talked to Emilia as if she had known her for years, descanted pathetically on the lonely life she was about to recommence at Teniet, on the liveliness and society she had left behind at Algiers, and on the discomforts and difficulties of keeping house in Africa. She interested herself in Madame Gower too, was enchanted to hear that she was also bound to the fort, promised to ride with her and walk with her when Monsieur was busy painting, and added, sighing, "But then you will go away, and I shall be even duller than if you had never come."

"We may stay out here some time," Emilia said, "Harold-Monsieur Gower likes solitary places so much, and there are lots of things for him to paint."

"Mon Dieu! yes, and perhaps other English may come down before long; it is not so very unusual during this time of the year."

"But we are not hungering and thirsting for a sight of our country-people," Emilia answered a little impatiently. "It is pleasant to get away from them sometimes."

"Ah! I forgot. You are making your luxe de miel," answered Madame Challamel; whereupon Emilia coloured, and was silent. The night brought an infinity of trials to poor Emilia. In the first place Monsieur Charles chose to cry for cakes, and as none were to be had, went on crying. In the second, Mademoiselle Marie had eaten stewed plums to an unjustifiable extent at dinnertime, and was attacked with sickness and spasms. In the third, the baby proved a most insatiable baby, accompanying each meal with a very obstreperous grace indeed. Madame Challamel and the nurse-maid took all these things very much as a matter of course, waking up when wanted, and sleeping profoundly as soon as a lull came; whilst Emilia worked herself into quite a fever of impatience, and rose at sunrise, having never closed her eyes at all.

An hour or two later Harold found her sitting beside a little spring outside the walls of the caravansera, her hair tossed disconsolately about her shoulders, her toilette uncaredfor, her cheeks flushed.

"Oh, Harold! she cried, "I haven't had any sleep, on account of those crying children, and my head aches so. If we have any children, you must sell plenty of pictures and get a big house with a nursery built almost as high as the clouds, or I shall pray for a massacre of the innocents."

He sat down beside her, and in a very short time had soothed away the vexation, of which he was, however, far from guessing the real

cause.

THE SNOW QUEEN.

I was a maiden cold as ice,
My heart was cold and hard as a stone,
All day long in a turret high

I sat and watched alone.

From my turret loophole forth I gazed,
Over a world that was white with snow,
I heeded not the dance and song

In the castle hall below.

There were gallant knights and ladies gay
In the lighted castle hall below;
They called me to join their revelry,
Nor recked if I came or no.

In their careless joy they called me down,

It mattered not if I came or no;
My hands were stiff and blue with cold
As I gazed out over the snow.

My true-love came with gentle eyes,
And looked through mine down into my heart;
That gaze was like the soft spring sun,
Which bids the snow depart.

He look'd straight down into my soul
With eyes so pensive, soft, and fair :
He gazed into its deepest depths,
And read my secret there.

JOHN SMITH, ESQUIRE, GENTLEMAN.

IN introducing to my readers so old and well-known an acquaintance, one who may properly be styled "Our Mutual Friend," I "Our Mutual Friend," I propose, without in the slightest degree detracting from his eminently respectable character, to inquire whether he is not (unconsciously, I am aware,) a bit of an impostor, and an assumer of titles to which he has no claim. And although some may fear that it must be a fearfully radical proceeding to analyse a man, and to call him just what he is and no more, thus ignoring the conventionalities of society, I hope, on the contrary, to show that these doctrines are of the highest conservatism. Our friend, John Smith (I cannot call him "Esquire" until I know that he has a right to it), nevertheless claims, or expects to be so addressed when written to, and is also under the firm impression that he is a gentleman. Everybody in these democratic days is a gentleman; and if an angry individual ventures to assert that you are not one, the answer is generally given in the shape of a blow or a still more ignominious kick; forty years ago it would have been an invitation to a brace of pistols. So, if you receive a letter addressed Mr. John Smith, you set down the writer either as an ignorant person who knows no better, or as one who designedly intends to snub you, and you open the letter with a muttered "Confound the fellow!" and a determination not to answer it. Certainly, if the proper definition of the word " gentleman means one who is perfect in manners, education, feelings, and thoughts, and kind and considerate toward others, whether high or low, it is only a pleasing stretch of fancy to assume that you are addressing one, although it is seldom that such a paragon is found in these days.

But when we have the direct and rather embarrassing question put to us, 66 Do you mean to assert that I am not a gentleman ?" it is as well to know how to deal with it, and, if necessary, show that your opinion was only expressed in a parliamentary sense. Our friend John Smith has, in common with many other friends, a weakness for the aristocracy, and thinks it would be the highest ambition of man, either by realising a large fortune from other people, or by his own brilliant talents, to ascend so far in the social scale as to become a lord. Perchance his ambition may be gratified; but it does not follow that he becomes a gentleman for all that. James I.'s nurse followed him from Edinburgh to London to entreat his majesty to make her son a gentleman. "My good dame," said the king, "I can make him a lord, but it is out of my

And

power to make him a gentleman." Selden, in his "Table Talk," goes so far as to say, in the rather irreverent manner in which they talked in his time, that even the Almighty could not make one.

These answers, at all events, show one thing; that the word gentleman was then much better defined than it is now, and that it had certain rights and privileges attached to it, of which it is now utterly divested. Indeed the comical manner in which it is often used is quite enough to prove that people do not know what it means, for not only is everybody who wears a decent coat a gentleman, but the word is applied by every class of society. The porter who lounges in his gigantic chair, and condescends to show you out, is the "gentleman in the hall;" Jeames is the "gentleman in uniform;" while the valet is the " is the gentleman's gentleman." Again, in the snuggery of an inn bar, the appellation is in great request, it being apparently against the etiquette of convivial society to speak of your neighbour as a person; and at an ordinary or a commercial dinner the same punctiliousness is noticed, bagmen, as a rule, being excessively careful of their dignity. Indeed, to descend to the bottom of the scale, I have more than once heard the prisoner in the dock declaring that "he warn't a doin' nuffin' till the genelman kem and tuk him up; " an epithet which has a bland and conciliatory influence on Policeman X 51.

In Germany the barons used to be styled the "noble-born;" but, after a while, the plebeian element began to ascend, and those who got into office were also addressed by their flatterers as "noble-born." The barons took such umbrage at this assumption of title, that they determined to assume that of "highwell-born," leaving the "noble-born" to the "novi homines." Presently, even these latter became ashamed of it, and in their turn took the appellation of " well-born," leaving the old distinction to the burghers and shopkeepers, and anybody who chose to be called by it. It is evident, therefore, that the "noble-born" are very much on a par with the "gentlemen of the present day. What our ancestors thought of the term is sufficiently exemplified by the old motto, “nobilis fit, nascitur generosus," and they included a gentleman amongst the nobility of the land. He might be a peer; but it did not therefore follow that a peer was a gentleman. Indeed, M. Ferri de St. Constant, in his work on London (1814), seems to have been very strongly of that opinion; for he writes, "As the chief part of the new peers are monied men, nabobs, merchants, or bankers, who have bought boroughs and seconded the views of the ministry, and

who, instead of shedding their blood for the state, have sucked up its marrow; so the title of baronet, which was formerly confined to military exploits, is now given to army agents and contractors, to shopkeepers and apothecaries." M. de St. Constant, although writing with a considerable spice of bitterness, was not badly informed, and his sentiments apply in the present day, perhaps even more strongly than they did then. What would he have said, I wonder, to the elevation of our railway contractors and engineers, our bankers, and iron-masters? Indeed, for the matter of that, I fear that it would be found that a good many recent creations would come under the head of the "nobilis " rather than the "generosus," and that the "lang penny" was at the bottom of most of them. Occasionally, but more rarely, our aristocracy is strengthened by the accession of men famous for deeds of chivalry, for renown in statesmanship or the world of letters, and these are the true gentlemen of England. But there are names to be found in Burke's "Landed Gentry," or in the "County Families,” which no amount of elevation could ennoble more than they are already, by their unbroken descent for many generations, or by their ancestral history; and not only "the twenty-third Lord of Hampden," but many a commoner, whose purse is not as long as his pedigree, and whose name, therefore, is not known out of his own county, would scoff at the offer of exchanging his old-established name for that of a new barony. It is curious how much ignorance has been shown as to the true position of a gentleman; for even Dr. Johnson, who was generally as accurate as he was pedantic, defines him to be, "One of good extraction, but not noble;" whereas, in all the old heraldic writers and in all proclamations, citations, and visitations, he is included in the rank of nobles.

Camden, who was Clarencieux King at Arms in 1623, wrote:-" Our noblemen are divided into greater and lesser, the lesser are the knights, esquires, and those whom we commonly call gentlemen." And Sir Thomas Smith (not an ancestor of our mutual friend, I fear,) wrote in the previous century:— "Wherefore to speak of the commonwealth of England, it is governed by three sorts of persons: the prince, which is called the king or the queen; the gentlemen, which are divided into two parts, the barons or estate of lords, and those which be no lords, as knights, esquires, and simple gentlemen. The third and last sort of persons are named the yeomen, who are not called 'masters,' for that, as I said before, pertaineth to gentlemen, but to their surnames add 'goodman.' One can scarcely fancy the farming interest of the present day not

being allowed to tack even plain "Mr." before their names. A gentleman, therefore, was one who was known to be noble from blood or race; and an esquire, who took precedence of the gentleman, was one entitled to bear arms (armiger). It would seem, however, that notwithstanding the precedence of an esquireship, it was easier to obtain that dignity than to become a gentleman. As in the case of one John Kingston, who was made an esquire by giving him a coat of arms, that he was thereby created a gentleman, but that he was received into the state of one." This must have been an embarrassing position for poor John Kingston, who was enabled to claim the rights of a gentleman, and yet was made to understand that he could not be

"not

thought as such. However, it was something in those days to get a coat of arms at all; for there were not then the same facilities for obtaining them as there are now, when the Herald's College is so quick at furnishing armorial bearings to the anxious applicantfor a consideration.

Peacham, an author of the 17th century, says :-" Coats of arms are sometimes purchased by stealth, or shuffled into records and monuments by painters, glaziers, and carvers. But so good an order has been lately established by the Earl Marshal, that this sinister dealing is cut off from such mercenary abuses of nobility." The difficulty of imposture was still more enhanced by the periodical visits of the Norroy and Clarencieux Kings at Arms, who had the right of summoning the gentry to the nearest town, and then and there examining their claims to gentility. Woe then to the Smiths who had usurped the title of esquire, for not only were their pretensions disallowed, but the fact was made public by the common crier in the market-place. One can fancy the consternation of the parvenus when they heard the heralds were coming, and knew that the time of exposure was drawing nigh, especially as they had not the advantage of numbers, which the mushrooms of the present day can claim. The fact of a man's being a peer did not take away his equally (and in many cases more) honourable title of esquire, as the following dedication shows:-"To the Right Worshipful Maister Robert Sackvill, Esquire, most worthy son and heir apparent to the Right Honourable Sir Thomas Sackvill, Knight, Lord Buckhurst, the rare hope and only expected imp of so noble roots and heir of so antient a family." This singular address shows, moreover, that to be an "imp in the 16th century was more respectable than it is now.

Sir James Lawrence, the author of a curious work on the nobility of the British gentry,