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good birth and social position, and she would get her medical position at once."

"You won't keep me quiet much longer," said a voice from a corner of the room. "I nearly died from internal convulsions last time they were here, to see the dear, gallant Doctor so desperately smitten. But I marvel not, for Dr. Ernestine is a delicious woman."

"I didn't know you were there, Mr. Silburn," exclaimed Miss Armine.

"Ah, I'm fond of my quiet nook,' said that gentleman. "Dorothy never knows how much I hear of her chatter." And so speaking, he drew back a curtain which fell over a deep bow-window, and became visible, just emerging from a hammock which was slung therein. He presented a quaint appearance as he advanced to shake hands with Miss Armine, for on each shoulder clung a very small kitten. The lady looked at him with professional pleasure; and, indeed, it was no wonder, for Coventry Silburn's face was of a dreamy, artistic beauty, and his movements were full of an entirely unconscious grace.

"Dorothy lets me have my hammock there on her kettledrum days, on condition that I don't make myself ridiculous-it's very good of her, isn't it? I never know what dear practical Dorothy regards as ridiculous, so I keep quiet and enjoy myself with my babies, who never scold me."

A knock was heard at that moment, so Coventry, with a laugh of childlike glee, vanished behind his curtain again. Dorothy's eyes followed him with a soft sweet look in them which he alone could

bring forth. Dorothy was, in truth, essentially prosaic-while her husband not only wrote lyrics but lived them, after his own gay, graceful, careless, loving fashion.

Coventry was seldom seen by anyone without some little helpless animal on his shoulder, or in his pocket, a favourite volume, or a manuscript book devoted to scribbling, in his hand.

Ernestine Vavasour entered, just as Mr. Silburn had made good his retreat. There was an unwonted look in her handsome face which both ladies noticed-with a less proud woman it might have been a blush-and both ladies thought it explained, when Dr. Doldy appeared behind her, at a distance measured only by the trail of her long dress.

"Together!" exclaimed Mrs. Silburn; and then added hastily, "How charming! Come near the fire, Miss Vavasour-you must be so cold!"

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We met," explained Dr. Doldy, with his gallant, punctilious manner, "at the corner of the street, Mrs. Silburn, and found that we were both coming to visit this most pleasant drawing-room of yours.'

"Miss Armine-Dr. Doldy," interposed Mrs. Silburn, anxious to spare him his excuses; and then she drew her little kettledrum table near the fire, and rang for the tea. Dr. Doldy, who was a man of the world, and full of pleasant gossip, began at once to talk to Miss Armine-but that quick-eyed lady observed that though he spoke to her, his regards were fixed on Miss Vavasour, and that he often tried to entice her into the conversation.

But Miss Vavasour was unusually silent. She never was a woman of small talk, although she went much into society. Perfectly gentle in manner, she was of a kind of burning, fierce disposition; if she might speak on her favourite subjects she would speak so earnestly and so well as to delight, even if not to convince. But if

those around her talked of mere ordinary matters which appeared to her not worth notice; or if they were uncongenial to her mode of thought, then, instead of quietly following the lead, as many women would, she preferred to lean back in her chair, very composed and handsome, with the abstracted look that came at such moments in her deep, soft, earnest eyes. That look had brought her many admirers, although most of them were rather afraid of her.

Dr. Doldy and Miss Armine were talking of some of the picture galleries which were open at the time.

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"Oh, I am not very learned," laughingly replied Miss Armine. "I am only a student yet, and shall be nothing more for many a year."

"Ha! ha ha!" laughed the Doctor, softly. "Well, I remember hearing of Fuseli's fury when first the admission of ladies to the Academy School was broached. He stumped off down the stairs, growling as he went, 'Have they no stockings to darn? Have they no puddings to make, that they must come here?' But those days are over. There's a new school rising now, Miss Armine, is there notand you, I suppose, are of it?"

Miss Armine shrugged her shoulders and said nothing; but looking up she caught such a flash from Miss Vavasour's deep eyes as made her feel that though Dr. Doldy might be a grandee of the old school she need not be crushed, for a champion was by her side, only waiting to be roused.

"And are you a student at the Academy?" resumed Dr. Doldy, as a little pause followed his last speech.

"No," she answered, "the Akropolitan School of Art is much more advanced in its system, so I entered there."

"The Akropolitan School? Ah -is not Mr. Richy the Professor there now?"

"Only temporarily," answered Miss Armine. "We are very anxious to learn who our Professor is to be."

"Mr. Richy is a talented man, and very agreeable," said Dr. Doldy. "He is a patient of mine."

"Oh, he is very agreeable," said Miss Armine, a little brusquely, "but he is no artist."

Dr. Doldy lifted his eyebrows. "You are always very hard on Mr. Richy," said Mrs. Silburn." I don't understand pictures, but he really paints very nicely."

"Now, Mrs. Silburn," exclaimed Miss Armine, "was it not you who wrote that paragraph about his making Lady Dollywoll buy a shawl to be painted in that cost some hundred pounds, and suggested that he probably got a commis sion from the shawl people?"

"Come, Miss Armine," answered the literary lady, "this is talking shop with a vengeance! I have to make gossipy paragraphs, and it does not follow that because Mr. Richy will only paint the portraits of very rich people, and makes them always have new silk dresses and India shawls for the occasion, that he does not paint well."

"New silk dresses," groaned Miss Armine. "Yes, that is just Mr. Richy. Could anything be more inartistic? And I know if we don't have another Professor soon he will do away with our life class. He is afraid of what the grand old ladies say that he meets in society-and he is just one of them himself!"

Now, Miss Armine," laughed Mrs. Silburn, "you are losing your temper."

"Well, no wonder-I shall have to leave the school if we lose our life class; I don't want to paint silk dresses-I want to draw my figures correctly, and to learn how from Nature itself!"

"Of course," said Miss Vavasour, "you can do nothing thoroughly unless you go right through with it. And I fancy Mr. Richy himself is a little doubtful about his anatomy, from the drawing of the figures in his picture in the Academy last year."

"Are you, then, an artist ?" said Dr. Doldy, delighted to hear Miss Vavasour's voice at last.

"Oh no," said she, drawing herself in at once, and with that odd look which might have been a blush coming over her face again, but I know just a little about anatomy."

"Do you? Dear me! what an odd subject for a lady to be interested in!-that is, if she does not really need it for her-her-profession."

Dr. Doldy's funny way of bringing out the last word made them all laugh, even Miss Vavasour; and in the midst of the laughter Coventry Silburn appeared, the kittens both on one shoulder this time.

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ladies any longer. How do you do, Dr. Vavasour?"

Dr. Vavasour shook hands with him-but now she blushed outright, a beautiful vivid blush: for Dr. Doldy had set his teacup down with a suddenness that made a ringing sound, and had risen to his feet. He looked at Miss Vavasour's face, and then he turned to Mrs. Silburn with an imploring gaze. As her husband had done the mischief, that lady was quite prepared to enjoy it.

"Yes, Dr. Doldy," she said, maliciously, "I fear Miss Vavasour belongs to a new school, as well as Miss Armine. She has taken her degree, and means to carry out some modern ideas in her practice. If you chanced to disagree with her views, you might find her a sharp antagonist on some points of medical doctrine."

Dr. Vavasour had turned to Miss Armine and was speaking earnestly to her about her studies-her back was nearly turned to Dr. Doldy, so that she could not see his face -but she could hear his silence. After forcing a smile for Mrs. Silburn, he had sunk back in his arm-chair-for the moment he forgot where he was, or who was speaking to him.

"Good heavens !" he was saying to himself, "what have I done?I, that have not lost my head for twenty years, to lose it now-and make such a ridiculous fool of myself! To fall in love with a lady doctor-it's no use now-it's too late-the woman dazzled my senses away-I proposed on the doorstep -and was accepted on the stairs! What little Puck has been tripping my steps? If I had but waited a decent opportunity she would have told me what she was -and I couldn't wait! WellGod bless me, how handsome she is-I couldn't have given her up."

And rising, he moved across the

room to her chair, and, in the next pause in her talk, congratulated her on her entrance into the profession in his most gallant and courteous manner.

"He is infatuated!" whispered Mrs. Silburn to her husband. Dr. Doldy had at the same moment whispered a word to Dr. Vavasour. She bowed ber head slightly. He turned to the Silburns.

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"Mrs. Silburn," he said, " and your husband are such good friends of ours that I am sure you will be pleased to hear that Miss Vavasour has consented to become my wife; and," he added, with an inimitable courtly grace, "as I am not now so young as to enjoy delays, she has allowed me to announce the fact at once."

A little buzz of chatter and congratulation followed this speech, for they all tried to help out a rather awkward moment. In the midst of it Coventry went quietly to Dr. Vavasour's side.

"Minerva Medica," said he, "I am ashamed of you."

"What was I to do?" she answered; and looking, he saw tears in her eyes. And his poetic heart recognised that she was in love!

CHAPTER II.

MINGLING STREAMS.

DOCTOR DOLDY's carriage, as he well knew, was waiting for him at the door. He had to make one or two professional visits which would barely leave him time to reach his house at the dinner-hour. And so after a few minutes more of talk, he tore himself from Miss Vavasour's side and made his bow. Miss Armine very soon followed his example; for general conversation did not flow very easily after Dr. Doldy's little announcement. When they were gone Ernestine drew nearer the fire, and sitting

between Coventry and Dorothy, talked far into the twilight, about her thoughts, her hopes, her future.

"You are a strange woman, Minerva Medica," said Coventry, rising from his seat by her side, after a while. "You are in love thoroughly, for you can only do things thoroughly-and yet it seems to be quite a side affair in your life."

"Not necessarily so," said she, gently, "because I talk of other things more-and think of them more, too. Is it not likely that the real centre of our lives is not that about which we busy ourselves the most? I suppose a man's home is his centre of life, when it is really a home; but it is to him his place of rest, not his place of worry, as most women's homes are to them. You know, Mr. Silburn, that I believe a woman only enlarges her life by work, not alters it; and if she grows larger surely her capacity for rest and affection will but be the greater?"

"I am glad to hear you say that so sweetly, Ernestine," said Dorothy, "for indeed I was beginning to think you were growing daily more practical."

"Surely you don't object to that, Mrs. Silburn? You set us all an example in practical capacity."

"But it suits me- -I'm just a commonplace little woman-but you have always made me feel as if you were the sort of woman to consecrate yourself to something."

"That is what I am doing," said Ernestine, quietly. "I do consecrate myself to my beliefs. But in the nineteenth century it is necessary for us to understand the practical; to obtain power by knowledge, and to be afraid of no details, for these are days of details. If we have inspiration it is of very little use to

us, now that the masses obtain education, unless we can give it a backbone by means of both knowledge of the world and knowledge of the sciences."

And yet," said Coventry, "knowledge, even of the sciences, of the arts, of this life-knowledge even of human nature-knowledge is but a little thing. Inspiration ought to carry us far beyond this life beyond anything we know or understand-into the great realities."

"You are speaking of poetic inspiration," said Ernestine. The poet or the seer may escape from the limits of our present life; but not so the practical teacher, the practical worker. I suppose all my largest aims might be reduced into the simple fact that I want to help people around me in their lives. And to do that I must be perfectly practical, or I am nothing."

"I admire your courage,' ," said Coventry. "I believe I should die if I put myself in your fetters. I admire you: but, oh! I thank Heaven for the ideal!"

"The ideal is greater than the practical, Mr. Silburn," said Ernestine, gravely. "It has wings which carry it over the mud in which we practical workers have to walk. But you grant me that if our vocation lies in the practical we should follow it thoroughly?"

Indeed I do," said Coventry, with a sigh; "and I say again I admire your courage."

Come," said Mrs. Silburn, "you two are turning into a Mutual Admiration Society. Ernestine, have you ever met Dr. Doldy's ward, Laura Doldy ?"

"No," she answered, leaning bak in her chair again, and retreating within herself a little. Ms. Silburn knew her sufficiently well to know what the look meant which came into her dark eyes.

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Ernestine Vavasour was greatly disliked by most of her female acquaintances because she was entirely incapable, by her very nature, of taking any interest in gossip. Many women, in her present position, would have keenly pricked their ears at the mention of Laura Doldy's name, and would have proceeded to extract from Mrs. Silburn everything which she knew about her. But Ernestine never took interest in personal details about individuals; when she herself met them she tested them by her own standard, and quickly decided whether they could belong to her real life or not. Possibly she sometimes decided a little too quickly, for Ernestine, though a creature whose bosom was full of burning faith and love, had been made into rather an unbeliever in the value or loveableness of the mass of human beings. And though she was regarded in her own circle as a champion of her sex, there was perhaps not a woman of her acquaintance whose integrity she deeply trusted in save Mrs. Silburn. For Ernestine's standard of integrity was different from that of many; those deep eyes of hers probed far into the characters of her friends. The small artifices, frivolities, weaknesses, which appeared to her so abundantly characteristic of her sex made that very sex for which she dared to plan a great future very unacceptable to her in the present.

"I hardly think you are likely to see much of her," resumed Mrs. Silburn. "She is scarcely ever at her uncle's house as it is, for she is always visiting. And then I heard something of an engagement not long ago. I don't know whether it is settled yet. But at

all events, whether she marries this man or no, she will marry some one before long," concluded

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