its purest and simplest phase no loftily imaginative author has chosen to depict. Literature in this respect has not advanced beyond the stage of those early and noble artists who thought it profane to represent the human figure entirely nude. With the failure of that reserve, although great beauty may be admirably depicted, the highest functions of the imagination cease. You admire a gallery of marble nymphs; you look in vain among them for what is fairer than the nymph, and nobler than the goddess-the blushing, sparkling, modest, inconsistent, yet not inconsistent, woman. No writer of fiction worthy the name ever set forth the chronicle of the honeymoon. The novelist must leave the bride before the altar. То attempt to accompany them in the wedding chariot, or to pourtray the raptures of the lovers made happy, from observations taken through the back window of the vehicle, is worthy only of the lowest members of that class which is accustomed to regard all human life from the same elevated but unrespected perch. It is a point of view from which numerous readers, and more than one very popular writer of modern fiction, seem to have a natural aptitude for regarding things-especially things above them. People have, unfortunately, been but too much accustomed to laugh at scenes, uninteresting enough in themselves, because they have been presented from what may be called the dickey point of view. English literature has not risen in consequence.

No less sacred to the man of refined taste is the tie between the mother and the son, when that tie is of its finest woof. Filial affection, indeed, is as legitimate, and as ancient, an element of drama as is that passion which is more generally spoken of by the name of

love. In the literature of the Chinese the honour and observance due to parents rank as the first of human virtues. That filial virtue was regarded among the Greeks is evident from the touching tale of the best gift accorded by the god, at the prayer of their grateful mother, to Cleobis and Biton. But into the intimate confidence of mother and son, the joy of the widowed parent in welcoming her longabsent one home, the envious parsimony with which she grudges the flight of every moment that is given to their interview, the writer of fiction can only hastily and reservedly enter.

Gilbert followed his brother like a shadow. He had grown taller, and paler, and thinner during his absence.

"He misses you almost as much as I do, Guy," said Mrs. Carrington.

Gilbert's delight was extreme at the present Guy brought him from Paris. "Such a cane, mamma; no one in Parkesbury has such a cane. The top is gold, or silver gilt at the least; and it has a real brass ferrule with an iron end." Gilbert was also profuse in his commentaries on his former letter on the subject of Stump.

This brief monosyllable was the name of a tortoiseshell cat of remarkable outline, being an illegiti mate or mongrel descendant of the famous tailless cats of the Isle of Man. The result of this impurity of descent was an unexpected modifi

cation in the distinctive feature of

the race. Stump was adorned with a semi-tail a truncated caudal appendage of about half the customary length, such as that which barbarism of taste, and the use of shears, render so common on the roofs of Lisbon. Only the Portuguese clip the ears of their cats, as well as their tails. Stump having now, for the first time, pro

duced stumplets, or, in common phrase, kittened, the interest of the fact was augmented by the unusual variety exhibited by the kittens. One resembled the mother caudally as much as in colour; one was a perfect black Manx, entirely tailless; and the third resembled an ordinary domestic cat.

For his mother Guy produced one of the wonders of the French workshop, one of those delicate, toy-like conveniences, in which neither Sheffield, nor Birmingham, nor London have ever rivalled French handicraft. It was a little ivory case, with engraved steel lock and hinges, containing a set of working implements-thimble, scissors, bodkin, needle-case, and stiletto, of gold and steel. It was fortunate for Mrs. Carrington, in this matter, that Lady Ullswater was not at home when Guy called. Not but that the mother would have had the preference, had both claimants on the loving gratitude of the young man been in presence at the same time; but it was a weakness of his character to give of the best he had, and the first claimant of those two would have had the etui. It is to be feared that, if Guy could have persuaded himself that Philippa would have accepted such a souvenir, it would not have seen daylight at Parkesbury.

"And you really like it, Guy? You think you shall continue to do So. As soon as you have quite made up your mind I shall make arrangements for leaving."

"You leave Parkesbury, mamma?"

"Where should my home be but near you, Guy? Under your roof, or my roof, till you bring me a daughter; and then as near as I can find a nook."

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE DOWN WELSH MAIL.

A DRIVE across the country, from Parkesbury to the nearest station on the Great Western Railway, enabled Guy to avoid a return to London, and afforded him some two hours more of his mother's society than he would have otherwise enjoyed. He struck the great artery of traffic a full quarter of an hour before the arrival of the mail train; and, on being conducted by the guard to the carriage devoted to the Plumport passengers, found himself again in the company of his former fellow-traveller, Mr. Thomas Slingsby.

Mr. Slingsby on this occasion had abandoned his suit of varied and splendid tartans for an attire more suitable to hot weather. Trousers of a light material, and a colour in which a reddish brown seemed to qualify a pale drab, were surmounted by a double-breasted salmon-coloured Marsala waistcoat. The shirt-front was of a Nankeen hue, varied by longitudinal stripes of purple, with pink coral studs; but the collar was white, and the necktie was of a delicate dove-coloured satin. satin. The coat, a species of short tunic, was of a brown mixture, umber shot with white, and he wore over it a whitish dust coat of thin alpaca. The wide-brimmed hat was of white felt, and the attire was completed by a pair of shining patent leather boots, of that wonderful structure that admits gores of an elastic material at the side, being at the same time garnished in front with numerous sinecure buttons-boots that proclaim themselves to be shams at the top of their voice. The expression is hardly metaphorical; for boots of that sort always creak.

This splendour of attire was the

more readily commended to the notice of Guy Carrington from the fact that Mr. Slingsby occupied two seats of the carriage by arranging himself in the shape of a capital W., or more correctly speaking, in that of a capital L., as the rise of the foot did not sufficiently balance that of the back to make a proper-turned W. His knees, that is to say, were supported by the division between the seats, so that he sat in one, with his legs in another. He had a cigar with an amber mouthpiece in his lips. "Told you we should again," quoth Mr. Slingsby. Going down to the Works ?" "Yes," said Guy, "I have just come from Paris."

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meet

"Ah," said the other, "if you had called on me first I could

have given you some first-rate

introductions at Paris. There's no making one's way in the world without good introductions."

"I had good introductions." "Hah! had you now-the Baron, I suppose?"

"Yes, that was one."

Never asked you to dinner, I'll bet five shillings," said Mr. Thomas Slingsby.

Guy acknowledged that he did

not.

"That's what I say," insisted the other. "For a thing to be good, it must be good. It doesn't do to be all of one side. A man may think no small beer of himself, and yet be no more use to you than oats to a horse when the ostler has greased his teeth. There's the Duke of Forçada-now he's another instance."

"Instance of what?" asked Guy. "Instance of being no use. I've had that man running after me," said Mr. Thomas Slingsby, drawing on his imagination-" like a terrier, and then when he had got what he wanted, no more thinking of asking me to his house than

he would you. Heard of him, I suppose ?"

"Yes, I have seen him.”

"Seen him!" said the other, a little starting up; "then you have the opportunity of judging for yourself of the truth of what I say. You found him very civil, no doubt."

No," said Guy, "I did not think him particularly civil."

"Is not that the very thing I told you?" replied the other. “No, no, there's no catching him without plenty of corn in the sieve. You didn't mention my name to him, I suppose."

It certainly had not occurred to Guy to do so.

"Better not," said the other, "much better not. You would have seen him change colour like a lobster when it is boiled. Why?" what do you think I said to him; inquired Mr. Slingsby, who had now recommenced drawing freely on his imagination.

Guy had no idea.

Sir," said the other, "he insulted me something about the Athens and Pyrenees Railway with which he had to do. He wanted to chouse me out of some shares. 'Mr. Duke,' said I, 'you are a duke now, but in two minutes you will be a mangled mass of dog's meat if you repeat that last observation;' ' and he took the hint," added Mr. Slingsby, looking fiercely, yet admiringly, at his own closed and ponderous fist.

"After all, what can you expect of a Frenchman?" he resumed; "look at their education. Poor little beggars, locked up in their licees at five years old, and never out of the sight of schoolmasters and their spies till they are eighteen or nineteen; what can you expect of them? If there is one class of people that I have a greater contempt for than another," said Mr. Slingsby, "it's schoolmasters."

"How would you get on without them?" said Guy.

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Here, in this country, strange to say," said the other, finally abandoning the stump of his cigar, "they are necessary evils-why, I should like to know, why necessary? Look at America-little plague with the schoolmaster there, you may take your oath; lads quite independent at sixteen."

Then how would you propose to train them till they are sixteen?" "With a good practical training," replied Mr. Slingsby, loftily. "Teach them as boys what they want to know as men. What do lads learn at Oxford or Cambridge, now? Boating and driving, and a little useless Latin and Greek. What use is Latin and Greek? Boating is all very well, but give a boy a dog and a gun, and he'll educate himself, without a tutor in a square cap and silk petticoats."

"Would you give them nothing but a dog and a gun?"

"A sound, practical education; that's what I observed. Let them

learn to read, and to write, and to cypher, at a good day-school. Never keep 'em locked up in the nursery; that's the way to make mollycoddles. If there is one man for whom I have a greater contempt than another, it's a molly-coddle."

Guy wished to know how to avoid becoming a molly-coddle.

"Give 'em the run of the house," replied Mr. Slingsby. "Let them see what the servants are after. How could you tell when a potato was properly boiled or a chop done with the gravy in it, if you'd never been in the kitchen, I should like to know? How is a man to order servants about properly, if he doesn't know how to do their work better than they do?"

"Then the children would grow up with the servants?"

Quite right too," said the other. "Acquire knowledge of life. As

they grow up, if there are any goodlooking servant-maids, they come to romp with them, quite naturally. Keeps lads out of mischief, out of the public-house, and bad company, and keeps the girls lively and fond of their place. Then a young man grows up without any sneaking shame and bashfulness, isn't afraid to speak to a woman if he sees her. I have known many a good chance lost just by a chap's being bashful."

"You think, then, that confidence is the great thing for success?"

"Strange to say," said the other, "all my mistakes in life have arisen from want of confidence, not want of self-respect-not so bad as that, but a sort of hanging back. But live and learn. Some horses can't stand too much corn, but none are the worse for a good feed at proper times."

"Well," said Guy, who began for a few seconds to feel as if his own education had been sadly unpractical, but who now became much amused, "then you would give a day-school elementary education, and a free run of the house; what else?"

"I don't object to a little parlez vous," said the other; " not necessary, but, if a French master comes handy, it does no harm. Strange to say, I often quite forget my French, though; not that it much matters. You see all foreigners, especially Frenchmen, are so confoundedly ignorant and self-opinionated, that the less you have to do with them the better, except in the way of business. Then make 'em come to you."

"You led me to understand that you had a large foreign connection."

"So I have so I have," said Mr. Slingsby. "A good horse is never a bad colour. Business is business, if it comes from the old gentleman himself, and must be

attended to accordingly." And Mr. Slingsby lighted another cigar.

Guy was not a connoisseur in tobacco. But he observed that the odour of the small dark-coloured roll now in process of consumption was, to his unsophisticated taste, more nauseous than that of the larger narcotic preparation inflicted on him on the former journey. He was looking with the effort of one who seeks to calculate how long it will be before the enemy is reduced to its last ash, when Mr. Slingsby, observing the direction of his eyes, emitted a profuse volume of smoke, and said, "Have a weed? Prime cheroots; nothing worth smoking but cheroots. Try one."

Guy, remembering the former profession of faith in something called Havannah, said, "I thought Havannahs were the best."

Aha, my boy," said the smoker; "can put you up to a wrinkle. You'll often hear of Havannahs that are good-never believe them; Havannah is dead. His foreman has carried on the business, but it's not the same thing as in the old man's time. No, nostick to cheroots; won't you have one ? "

"No," said Guy.

"See much of her?" "No."

Mr. Slingsby evidently meditated a further attack on the subject of Lady Frances. Then he thought better of it, and smoked. The train slackened, approaching Swindon. "Take my advice, and let me order you a glass of brandy and water," said he, extricating his long legs from the carriage. "Waitress won't try any tricks upon me. I know too well what is the right sort. Have a glass?"

And disgusted with Guy's unsociable negatives, Mr. Slingsby entered into a lively and confidential conversation with one of the young women behind the counter.

CHAPTER XXIV.

SLINGSBY, SKIPPER, AND CO. MR. THOMAS SLINGSBY appeared to be engaged in a large and multifarious business in many parts of the world. He was a partner, perhaps a sole partner, in many firms. There were Thomas Slingsby and Co., of Lower Thamesstreet, and Skipper and Slingsby, of Plumport, and Slingsby, Skipper and Co., of Gloucester, and perhaps even more; and Mr. Thomas Slingsby was perpetually oscillating between these various centres of attraction like a great plaid-coated pendulum.

The offices of this widely diffused firm in the town of Plumport consisted in one large room looking out over a convenient yard, accessible by canal, by road, and by railway. A little wooden railing ran across this room inside the door. Within the railing were two large desksor rather one large double desk, at which people had to stand, or to perch upon high stools to write; and a leather-covered writing table,