having had such an acquaintance at her command, that she had said, "Oh, that's nothing - for going back," and then had gone back to the grey eld that was so much anterior to Shelley's death and a fortiori so much anterior to Byron's. I retail this anecdote, however, precisely to emphasise my point that, interesting as her anecdotes might be, her attitude and her spirit (facts quite as definite, and certainly quite as "quaint" as her anecdotes) were things more interesting still. More even than the anecdotes they seemed to make a light, as to the social world which had been not as ours, on the question of human relations. If one arrived at something of a sense of such relations one sniffed up the essence of history—to which in the absence of that sense one remained blackly a stranger. And it glimmered before one as something the precious possession of which might bring one nearer to the ancient reality. Without it one was, at any rate in respect to any reproductive grasp of the ancient reality, a "muff." All this, however, is a far cry from the fleeting vision vouchsafed to our friends in the summer of 1850-albeit, at the same time, that connections are not wanting. There was, for instance, no more "regular" friend of the trenchant lady's final period than Robert Browning, who was also, with a deeper shade of intimacy, an ally (as we have seen him already begin to be) of the Storys. She was, in addition, thoroughly well-affected to Lowell, who was equally so to her; and these facts would have in some degree constituted a relation with her, her friends not being non-conductors, for others, so to speak, of her relation to them. This last truth, I may perhaps add, is lighted for me, with some intensity, by my own last reminiscence: a grey, wintry day and the company, in mourning-coach, during slow funereal hours, of

a

Browning and Kinglake, my companions of the pilgrim- ́ age. That was an occasion, verily, for as fine an appreciation of shades of intimacy as one might have cared to attempt. Browning was infinitely talkative, and Kinglake, old, deaf, delicate, distinguished, perfect, infinitely silent. Mrs. Procter, whose displeasure he had incurred, had not spoken to him for a quarter of a century. She was magnificent.

Henry James

From "William Wetmore Story and His Friends." Copyright by Houghton, Mifflin & Company.

Lady Everingham

LA

ADY EVERINGHAM was not a celebrated beauty, but she was something infinitely more delightful, a captivating woman. There were combined in her, qualities not commonly met together, great vivacity of mind with great grace of manner. Her words sparkled and her movements charmed. There was indeed, in all she said and did, that congruity that indicates a complete and harmonious organisation. It was the same just proportion which characterised her form: a shape slight and undulating with grace; the most beautifully shaped ear; a small, soft hand; a foot that would have fitted the glass slipper; and which, by the bye, she lost no opportunity of displaying; and she was right, for it was a model.

B. Disraeli

XIV

THE GENTLE

A good woman is an understudy for an angel.
Tom Taylor (in “David Garrick")

Lady Morton

E first deceased; she for a little tried

HE

To live without him, liked it not, and died.
Sir Henry Wotton

Sister Saint Luke

'HE lived shut in by flowers and trees

SHE

And shade of gentle bigotries.

On this side lay the trackless sea,

On that the great world's mystery;
But all unseen and all unguessed

They could not break upon her rest.

The world's far splendours gleamed and flashed,
Afar the wild seas foamed and dashed;

But in her small, dull Paradise,

Safe housed from rapture or surprise,

Nor day nor night had power to fright
The peace of God that filled her eyes.

John Hay

By special permission of Houghton Mifflin Company, publishers

of Mr. Hay's poems.

Edith

(From Aylmer's Field)

FAIRER than Rachel by the palmy well,

Fairer than Ruth among the fields of corn, Fair as the Angel that said "Hail!" she seem'd, Who entering fill'd the house with sudden light. For so mine own was brighten'd: where indeed The roof so lowly but that beam of Heaven Dawn'd sometime thro' the doorway? whose the babe

Too ragged to be fondled on her lap,

Warm'd at her bosom? The poor child of shame
The common care whom no one cared for, leapt
To greet her, wasting his forgotten heart,
As with the mother he had never known,
In gambols; for her fresh and innocent eyes
Had such a star of morning in their blue,
That all neglected places of the field
Broke into nature's music when they saw her.
Low was her voice, but won mysterious way
Thro' the seal'd ear to which a louder one
Was all but silence free of alms her hand
The hand that robed your cottage-walls with
flowers

Has often toil'd to clothe your little ones;
How often placed upon the sick man's brow,
Cool'd it, or laid his feverous pillow smooth!
Had you one sorrow and she shared it not?
One burthen and she would not lighten it?
One spiritual doubt she did not sooth?

Or when some heat of difference sparkled out,

How sweetly would she glide between your wraths,

And steal you from each other! for she walk'd
Wearing the light yoke of that Lord of love

Who still'd the rolling wave of Galilee!

Lord Tennyson

Madam Liberality

MA

letter.

ADAM LIBERALITY made up her mind about the dresses and aprons; then she opened her

It announced the death of her cousin, her godmother's husband. It announced also that, in spite of the closest search for a will, which he was supposed to have made, this could not be found. . .

After a second reading Madam Liberality picked up the thread of the narrative and arrived at the result — she had inherited fifteen thousand a year. . .

...

Madam Liberality poked the fire extravagantly, and sat down to think.

The curtains naturally led her to household questions, and those to that invaluable person, Jemima. That Jemima's wages should be doubled, trebled, quadrupled, was a thing of course. What post she was to fill in the new circumstances was another matter. Remembering Podmore, and recalling the fatigue of dressing herself after her pretty numerous illnesses, Madam Liberality felt that a lady's-maid would be a comfort to be most thankful for. But she could not fancy Jemima in that capacity, or as a housekeeper, or even as head housemaid or cook. She had lived for years with Jemima herself, but she could not fit her into a suitable place in the servants' hall.

However, with fifteen

thousand a year, Madam