grassy path of even sward led through the
forest, and taking one of those which skirted
the stream, I strolled along, unconscious alike
of time and place. Out of the purely personal
interests which occupied my mind sprang others,
and I bethought me with a grim satisfaction of
the severe lesson Mary must have, ere this, read
Rose upon her presumption and her flippancy,
telling her, in stern accents, how behind that
screen the man was standing she had dared to
make the subject of her laughter. Oh, how she
blushes! what flush of crimson shame spreads
over her face, her temples, and her neck; what
large tears overflow her lids, and fall along her
cheeks. I actually pity her suffering, and am
pained at her grief.

"Spare her, dear Mary!" I cry out; "after
all, she is but a child. Why blame her that she
cannot measure greatness, as philosophers
measure mountains, by the shadow?"

Egotism in every one of its moods and tenses
must have a strong fascination. I walked on
for many a mile while thus thinking, without
the slightest sense of weariness, or any want of
food. The morning glided over, and the hot
noon was passed, and the day was sobering down
into the more solemn tints of coming evening,
and I still loitered, or lay in the tall grass, deep
in my musings.

In taking my handkerchief from my pocket,
I accidentally drew forth the priest's letter, and
in a sort of half-indolent curiosity proceeded to
read it. The hand was cramped and rugged,
the writing that of a man to whom the manual
part of correspondence is a heavy burden, and
who consequently incurs such labour as rarely
as is possible. The composition had all the
charm of ease, and was as unstudied as need
be; the writer being evidently one who cared
little for the graces of style, satisfied to discuss
his subject in the familiar terms of his ordinary
conversation.

Although I do not mean to impose more than
an extract from it on my reader, I must reserve
even that much for my next chapter.

THE COMMON ROMAN.

IT being long since settled on competent
authority that the noblest study for mankind is
man, I go forth one fresh morning into the elastic
Roman air, with a social stereoscope to my
eyes, casting about for slides. From among
the lower ranks and inferior strata, where
alone the live embers of a nation's nobility may
be found smouldering, though extinct
elsewhere, I will draw my model and matchless
plebeian, in contrast to the Noble Roman
represented in my last. "I shall see," I say to
myself, warming with a generous enthusiasm—
"I shall see in the Common Roman a noble
heart bowed down, striving to assert itself. I
shall see a brave race, patient in suffering, but
full of hope for the future, waiting for the hour,
and perhaps the man. I shall see passing in the
open street, with downcast yet sadly expectant
eye, some possible Rienzi, some undiscovered
Brutus. I shall see——"

At this moment, speculation ending, a slide is
abruptly presented of an unsatisfactory description;
and I grieve to say that, by the time my
whole collection is complete, I am helped to this
tame and dismal conclusion:—that the highly
moral and sternly virtuous Roman plebeian, waiting
in patient resignation for the day of his
regeneration, is no more than a sad imposture. No
vamping of him up into a severe ancient Roman
will do. He fits but awkwardly into the classical
suit his friends and admirers have provided for
him; and to put him as a lay figure through
the traditional poses plastiques, arrange him
as Marius among the ruins, or Curtius at the
edge of the gulf, or as the stoical pattern
Roman sitting at his hearth, newly come in from
his plough and waving off the deputation from
the republic, is a hopeless and dispiriting task.
Let us, however, give him full credit for his
playing of Belisarius, with the piteous Date
Obolum refrain, and expressively extended hat
—a poor washed-out article, a pinchbeck Palais
Royal imitation of the fine old material—the
blood of the Romulus and Remus vagabondage
has come down faithfully; yet that other nobler
mixture which came in later and fortified the
impure current, is drained away altogether.

Shall I look for it in the cheeks of this
noble reverend-looking ancient, who comes along
leaning feebly with both hands upon his long
staff? With those gentle eyes; that matchless
beard flowing in such soft lines; that
picturesque dress of the sugar-loaf hat (which can
never be repeated too often); and the blue toga
with the jacket and coloured stockings; he
appeals to my warmest sympathies, and rather still
to that silver treasury of Pauls which I take
abroad with me in an eternal city. I can fancy
him a prince of nobles, a marchese, an
eccellenza, who has had a palazzo of his own, and
broad lands. I am, indeed, heartily and without
invitation, inclined to pity the sorrows of this
poor old man, whose trembling steps have borne
him to my door; likewise, to speculate (adapting
a well-known ballad to the situation) of
what is the old man thinking as he leans on his
oaken staff? But when I turn my eyes on
the little woman who clings to the sire's blue
toga helplessly: an actual miniature, with
tazoletto snowy white, and little tawny neck just
peeping out of the linen gathers, with the
bodice and coloured skirt all complete: and
again turn to the little man who balances her
on the other side—a little pocket brigand with
Guy Fawkes hat and jacket, and leggings wound
round plentifully, all on a reduced scale—the
appeals to my silver sympathies become
clamorous. Suddenly a thought of recognition; and,
it strikes me, that I have seen the face and flowing
beard of the reduced nobleman before now.
Ridiculous localities, such as Regent-street and
the Boulevard des Italiens obtrude themselves
with an absurd improbability, and yet with a
curious persistency. Surely not grinding at the
distracting organ, O reduced nobleman? I