"How amazed she'll be to hear that she saw
a letter—read it—held it in her hands,"
muttered he, "but, I'll stake my life she'll never
doubt the fact when it is told to her by those
who believe it."

"You seem to be in rare spirits," said Barnard,
when Calvert returned to the inn. " Have
you proposed and been accepted?"

Not exactly," said the other, smiling," but
I have had a charming evening; one of those
fleeting moments of that 'vie de famille' Balzac
tells us are worth all our wild and youthful
excesses."

"Yes!" replied Barnard, scoffingly;
"domesticity would seem to be your forte. Heaven help
your wife, say I, if you ever have one."

"You don't seem to be aware how you
disparage conjugal life, my good friend, when you
speak of it as a thing in which men of your stamp
are the ornaments. It would be a sorry institution
if its best requirements were a dreary
temperament and a disposition that mistakes
moodiness for morality."

"Good night; I have had enough," said the
other, and left the room.

"What a pity to leave such a glorious spot
on such a morning," said Calvert, as he stood
waiting while the post-horses were being
harnessed. "If we had but been good boys, as we
might have been—that is, if you had not fallen
into matrimony, and I into a quarrel—we should
have such a day's fishing here! Yonder, where
you see the lemon-trees hanging over the rock,
in the pool underneath there are some twelve
and fourteen 'pounders,' as strong as a good-sized
pike; and then we'd have grilled them
under the chesuut-trees, and talked away, as
we've done scores of times, of the great figure
we were to make- I don't know when or how,
but some time and in some wise- in the world;
astonishing all our relations, and putting to utter
shame and confusion that private tutor at Dorking,
who would persist in auguring the very worst
of us."
"Is that the bill that you are tearing up ?
Let me see it. What does he charge for that
Grignolino wine and those bad cigars ?" broke
in Barnard.

"What do I know or care?" said Calvert,
with a saucy laugh. " If you possessed a schoolboy's
money-box with a slit in it to hold vour
savings, there would be some sense in looking
after the five-franc pieces you could rescue from
a cheating landlord, and add to your store; but
when you know in your heart that you are never
the richer nor the better of the small economies
that are only realised at the risk of an apoplexy
and some very profane expressions, my notion
is, never mind them — never fret about them."

"You talk like a millionnaire," said the other,
contemptuously.

"It is all the resemblance that exists between
us, Bob; not, however, that I believe Baron
Rothschild himself could moralise over the
insufficiency of wealth to happiness as I could.
Here comes our team, and I must say a sorrier
set of screws never tugged in a rope harness.
Get in first. I like to show all respect to the
man who pays. I say, my good fellow," cried
he to the postilion, " drive your very best, for
mi Lordo here is immensely rich, and would just
as soon give you five gold Marengos as five
francs."

"What was it you said to him ?" asked Barnard,
as they started at a gallop.

"I said he must not spare his cattle, for we
were running away from our creditors."

"How could you—-"

"How could I ? What nonsense, man !
besides, I wanted the fellow to take an interest in
us, and, you see, so he has. Old Johnson was
right; there are few pleasures more exhilarating
than being whirled along a good road at the top
speed of post-horses."

"I suppose you saw that girl you are in love
with?" said Barnard, after a pause.

"Yes; two of them. Each of the syrens has
got a lien upon my heart, and I really can't say
which of them holds ' the preference shares.' "

"Is there money?"

" Not what a great Croesus like yourself would
call money, but still enough for a grand
'operation' at Homburg, or a sheep-farming exploit in
Queensland."

"You're more ' up ' to the first than the
last."

"All wrong! Games of chance are for fellows
like you, who must accept Fortune as they find
her. Men of my stamp mould destiny."

"Well, I don't know. So long as I have
known you, you've never been out of one scrape
without being half way into another."

"And yet there are fellows who pay dearer
for their successes than ever I have done for my
failures."

"How so? What do they do?"

"They marry! Ay, Bob, they marry rich
wives, but without any power to touch the
money, just as a child gets a sovereign at
Christmas under the condition he is never
to change it."

"I must say you are a pleasant fellow to
travel with."

"So I am generally reputed, and you're a
lucky dog to catch me ' in the vein,' for I don't
know when I was in better spirits than this
morning."

CHAPTER. X. A DAY BREAK BESIDE THE RHINE.

The day was just breaking over that wide
flat, beside the Rhine at Basle, as two men,
descending from a carriage on the high road, took
one of the narrow paths which lead through the
fields, walking slowly, and talking to each other
in the careless tone of easy converse.

" We are early, Barnard, I should say; fully
half an hour before our time," said Calvert, as
he walked on first, for the path did not admit; of
two abreast. " VVhat grand things these great
plains are, traversed by a fine river, and spreading
away to a far distant horizon. What a sense
of freedom they inspire; how suggestive they
are of liberty; don't you feel that ?"