in the world under present circumstances. What might not a clever, gifted, handsome woman accomplish for the family fortunes, long at a low ebb? Especially happy, too, the finding of such a bride for the new Duke, a plain, blunt soldier, with hardly a word to say for himself. So at least gossiped the friendly kinsfolk of the bride and bridegroom elect. The time for the marriage was fixed, wedding presents and congratulations already began to pour in. The marriage settlements were being drawn up. How could Waldemar speak out? Difficult as disclosure had been in the beginning, it seemed wholly impracticable now. Such an affair could not be kept

All the country would be set a tittering, and the story once noised abroad could nevermore be silenced or forgotten. It was this feeling that made the young soldier's cheek flame and his veins tingle. He felt able to brave scorn, indignation, even contempt, but not the shame born of ridicule. He was ready to affront and defy his kinsfolk and his people by marrying a peasant, but he shrank from the notion of becoming a general laughing-stock. The dupe of his kinswoman, the apparent victim of an intrigue, the sport of the woman he loved! It was not to be borne.

Had Hilda been a mere piece of irreproachable feminine ordinariness, disentanglement might have been feasible. Had she as nearly matched her foster-sister in parts and lineaments, a re-exchange for the time being might have been effected; the engagement with his cousin, the real Hildegarde, broken off; and later, honestly and before all the world, dame Anna's granddaughter made his bride. But this delicious impostor was peerless. She could no more be matched among all living womankind than we can match the sunset dyes of yestreen. It was then to necessity that the enraptured lover turned at last. He could not do otherwise than be foolishly happy.

And Hilda! Her satisfaction knew no bounds. She had never felt his scruples. She had always believed in the innocency of her jest.

'Do you know what I had determined to do?' she asked of her adorer when all was settled. 'On waking up once more to find myself dame Anna's granddaughter, I intended to study for the stage, and act there the grand parts denied to me in real life. That would have been a consolation.'

"I hope not,' was the lover-like reply. At any rate, it would not have consoled me.'

'Then you would have proved yourself a poor creature,' retorted Hilda, dominating, lording it over the whole world always.

Least of all were Hildegarde and Dr. Edouard likely to find fault with the turn affairs had taken. The self-reliant, somewhat arrogant young doctor had made up his mind that the result was to be no otherwise long ago. This timid, fawn-like thing that had fled to his sheltering arms for love and protection, should never be torn from him.

'Never fear,' he had said, when disquieting news would at first

were no longer mine, and who can say that this is impossible? The sickly child yet lives and may recover his health. I may wake up one morning to recover my freedom.'

He once more caught her hand, lover-like, to his lips, adding, eagerly- If so, I should be free, like Dr. Edouard, to marry whom I pleased. And a proud day for me, when honestly, and before all the world, I might choose for my bride the peasant-born Hilda.'

They saw the Hofrath descending the terrace, and he had only time to add-But we must gain time. We must do nothing

underhand. Time-and silence. You understand.'

XVIII.

TIME and silence! What will they not do, and undo indeed? And what may not a jest, a bagatelle, do also? It would seem in this strange phantasmagoria called human life, that the veriest whim, the airiest fancy, may sometimes shape itself into the destiny of mortals, when often, the uphill endeavour of years, and the patient, toilsome hopes of half a lifetime, prove barren and ineffective. Be this as it may, certain it is that we see our fellows sometimes strangely fated by trifles light as air.' The solution of such problems may be in the fact that it is only exceptional human nature that goes out of the ordinary groove even so far as wishing, dreaming, or freaking, and that the destiny of those who stand thus aloof from ordinariness must be out of the common way.

Somehow the romantic or heroic element will manifest itself. After that conversation between Hilda and her lover, followed a succession of surprises, or what seemed surprises, taking their breath away, dumbfounding them, and rendering disclosure impossible. Even their secret and its responsibilities were now thrust into the background.

In the turn affairs had now taken at the Schloss, it was impossible for them to come forward; and delay, of course, made disclosure doubly and trebly difficult. In the first place the blind old Duke died suddenly, and no sooner were the funeral ceremonies over, than news came of the death of the sickly lad who had been his heir. The lovers were now pushed into a conspicuous place, and every thought, every moment, belonged for the time to others.

Hilda, by the side of her pseudo-aunt, the Duchess, found herself compelled to perform the part of daughter of the house. Nor did the fame of these girlish graces and endowments remain in the little Remote kinsfolk of the house wanted to make the acquaintance of this brilliant girl, who up till the present time had been buried in the schoolroom. The gratification was enormous that at last a house particularly unendowed by nature in the female line should

in the world under present circumstances. What might not a clever, gifted, handsome woman accomplish for the family fortunes, long at a low ebb? Especially happy, too, the finding of such a bride for the new Duke, a plain, blunt soldier, with hardly a word to say for himself. So at least gossiped the friendly kinsfolk of the bride and bridegroom elect. The time for the marriage was fixed, wedding presents and congratulations already began to pour in. The marriage settlements were being drawn up. How could Waldemar speak out? Difficult as disclosure had been in the beginning, it seemed wholly impracticable now. Such an affair could not be kept dark. All the country would be set a tittering, and the story once noised abroad could nevermore be silenced or forgotten. It was this feeling that made the young soldier's cheek flame and his veins tingle. He felt able to brave scorn, indignation, even contempt, but not the shame born of ridicule. He was ready to affront and defy his kinsfolk and his people by marrying a peasant, but he shrank from the notion of becoming a general laughing-stock. The dupe of his kinswoman, the apparent victim of an intrigue, the sport of the woman he loved! It was not to be borne.

Had Hilda been a mere piece of irreproachable feminine ordinariness, disentanglement might have been feasible. Had she as nearly matched her foster-sister in parts and lineaments, a re-exchange for the time being might have been effected; the engagement with his cousin, the real Hildegarde, broken off; and later, honestly and before all the world, dame Anna's granddaughter made his bride. But this delicious impostor was peerless. She could no more be matched among all living womankind than we can match the sunset dyes of yestreen. It was then to necessity that the enraptured lover turned at last. He could not do otherwise than be foolishly happy.

And Hilda! Her satisfaction knew no bounds. She had never felt his scruples. She had always believed in the innocency of her jest.

'Do you know what I had determined to do?' she asked of her adorer when all was settled. 'On waking up once more to find myself dame Anna's granddaughter, I intended to study for the stage, and act there the grand parts denied to me in real life. That would have been a consolation.'

6

'I hope not,' was the lover-like reply. At any rate, it would not have consoled me.'

'Then you would have proved yourself a poor creature,' retorted Hilda, dominating, lording it over the whole world always.

Least of all were Hildegarde and Dr. Edouard likely to find fault with the turn affairs had taken. The self-reliant, somewhat arrogant young doctor had made up his mind that the result was to be no otherwise long ago. This timid, fawn-like thing that had fled to his sheltering arms for love and protection, should never be torn from him.

'Never fear,' he had said, when disquieting news would at first

come from Hilda. 'If any attempt be made to force your will, I have the remedy in my own hands.' Whereupon he would point to the map of America.

"There are neither dukelings nor princelings there,' he added; 'and, but for my good mother and sisters, in the new democratic world my home would have been made long ago.' When he heard that matters were to take their smooth course he showed no emotion. He had already fallen in with the sentiment of Hilda's epigram, 'Exchange is no robbery. Why not be happily fated even by a

jest ?'

So on the very same day a brilliant wedding pageant took place at the court, and the simplest possible bridals were solemnized at a little country town far away. And, needless to say, had any person known who cared to tell that the bride of Dr. Edouard was a daughter of the royal house, and that the beautiful and incomparable Duchess was her peasant-born foster-sister, who would have believed the story?

(The End.)

NOTH

JOHN INGLESANT.1

[OTHING can be more futile than the objections which are usually brought against the historical novel. Aristotle, who knew what he was talking about, told us long ago that poetry was truer than history, and no historian can be above learning something from Romola' or 'Esmond.' History itself is concerned not so much with facts as with the relations between facts, and the novelist has an advantage over the historian in being able to throw aside a mass of facts of secondary importance, and to embody in creations of his own the life and spirit of a bygone age. With his additional freedom, however, comes a greater burden of responsibility, and he binds himself, if his work be seriously undertaken, to present to his readers characters and situations which could possibly have existed, and which, if they did exist, can teach them something worth knowing about the period which he has attempted to illustrate.

That Mr. Shorthouse has seriously undertaken bis work it is impossible to doubt. John Inglesant' is neither the result of the author's idle hours, nor is it likely to be taken up to while away the idle hours of the ordinary novel-reader. It is, therefore, the more creditable to that much-abused personage, the average Mudie-reader, that the book should have enjoyed so wide a circulation. The copy before me announces that it has reached a fourth thousand. And, unless rumour has been unusually deceptive, it has fascinated not a few readers of more than ordinary intelligence and acquaintance with mankind.

For this success there are many causes. In the first place, there is an air of strangeness about the book, and that which is strange is certain to attract attention. The scenes are varied, and are often striking, and there is a restfulness even about its most agitated passages which springs from the hero's consciousness of Divine guidance, and his persistent search for the Divine light, which he recognises as the true object of his quest. Nor among the least of its recommendations to some minds is the fact that the principal character is without any semblance of a creed, so that his Platonism is not in any way cabined within the doctrines of any particular Christian sect.

Yet pleasant as the book is to read, it is worth while to ask whether it is true, whether, that is to say, its characters could possibly have developed themselves as they are said to have done in the England of Charles I. Of some part of that age, indeed, Mr. Shorthouse is able to give us a true as well as a lively picture. The figure of the King, for instance, is drawn with exceeding skill, and