still, what, if they should chance to be remarkably
good sort of English? I conclude we shall meet
them at supper."

"Yes and there goes the bell for that gathering,
which on the present occasion will be a thin one.
They're all gone off to that fair at Lahnech."
And so saying, Calvert drew nigh a glass, and
made one of those extempore toilets which
young men with smart moustaches are accustomed
to perform before presenting themselves
to strangers. Loyd merely took his hat, and
walked to the door.

"There! that ought to be enough, surely, for
all reasonable captivation!" said he, laughingly,

"Perhaps you are right; besides, I suspect
in the present case it is a mere waste of ammunition;"
and, with a self-approving smile, he
nodded to his image in the glass, and followed
his friend.

One line at this place will serve to record that
Calvert was very good looking; blue-eyed, blond-
whiskered, Saxon-looking withal; erect carriage
and stately air, which are always taken as favourable
types of our English blood. Perhaps a
certain over-consciousness of these personal advantages,
perhaps a certain conviction of the success
that had attended these gifts, gave him what,
in slang phrase, is called a " tigerish" air; but
it was plain to see that he had acquired his
ease of manner in good company, and that his
pretension was rather the stamp of a class than
of an indvidual.

Loyd was a pale, delicate-looking youth,
with dark eyes set in the deepest of orbits,
that, imparted sadness to features in
themselves sufficiently grave. He seemed what he
was, an overworked student, a man who had
sacrificed health to toil, and was only aware of
the bad bargain when he felt unequal to
continue the contest. His doctors had sent him
abroad for rest, for that, "distraction" which as
often sustain its English as its French acceptance,
and is only a source of worry and anxiety
where rest and peace are required. His means
were of the smallest he was the only son of a
country vicar, who was sorely pinched to afford
him a very narrow support and who had to raise
by a loan the hundred pounds that were to give
him this last chance of regaining strength and
vigour. If travel, therefore, had its pleasures,
it had also its pains for him. He felt, and very
bitterly, the heavy load that his present enjoyment
was laying upon those he loved best in
the world, and this it was that, at his happiest
moments, threw a gloom over an already moody
and depressed temperament.

The sad thought of those at home, whose
privations were the price of his pleasures,
tracked him at every step; and pictures of that
humble fireside where sat his father and his
mother, rose before him as he gazed at the noble
cathedral, or stood amazed before the greatest
triumphs of art. This sensitive feeling, preying
upon one naturally susceptible, certainly tended
little to his recovery, and even at times so overbore
every other sentiment, that he regretted he
had ever come abroad. Scarcely a day passed
that he did not hesitate whether he should not
turn his steps homeward to England.

CHAPTER II. THE PASSENGERS ON THE STEAM-
BOAT.

THE table d'hôte room was empty as the two
Englishmen entered it at supper-time, and they
took their places, moodily enough, at one end
of a table laid for nigh thirty guests. " All
gone to Lahnech, Franz?" asked Calvert of the
waiter.

"Yes, sir, but they'll be sorry for it, for
there's thunder in the air, and we are sure to
have a deluge before nightfall."

"And the new arrivals, are they gone too?"

"No, sir. They are up-stairs. The old lady
would seem to have forgotten a box, or a desk,
on board the steamer, and she has been in such
a state about it that she couldn't think of
supping; and the young ones appear to sympathise
in her anxieties, for they, too, said, 'Oh,
we can't think of eating just now.'"

"But, of course, she needn't fuss herself. It
will be detained at Mayence, and given up to
her when she demands it."

A very expressive shrug of the shoulders
was the only answer Franz made, and Calvert
added, " You don't quite agree with me, per-
haps?"

"It is an almost daily event, the loss of
luggage on those Rhine steamers; so much so,
that one is tempted to believe that stealing
luggage is a regular livelihood here."

Just at this moment the Englishwoman in
question entered the room, and in French
of a very home manufacture asked the waiter
how she could manage, by means of the
telegraph, to reclaim her missing property.

A most involved and intricate game of cross
purposes ensued; for the waiter's knowledge of
French was scarcely more extensive, and
embarrassed, besides, by some specialities in accent,
so that though she questioned and he replied,
the discussion gave little hope of an intelligible
solution.

"May I venture to offer my services, madam,"
said Calvert, rising and bowing politely. "If I
can be of the least use on this occasion—"

"None whatever, sir. I am perfectly
competent to express my own wishes, and have no
need of an interpreter;" and then turning to the
waiter, added: " Montrez moi le telegraph,
garçon."

The semi-tragic air in which she spoke, not
to add the strange accent of her very peculiar
French, was almost too much for Calvert's
gravity, while Loyd, half pained by the ridicule
thus attached to a countrywoman, held
down his head and never uttered a word.
Meanwhile the old lady had retired with a haughty
toss of her lowering bonnet, followed by
Franz.

"The old party is fierce," said Calvert, as he
began his supper, " and would not have me at
any price."

"I suspect that this mistrust of each other
is very common with us English: not so much