quite at home, gliding from group to group of
gaily-dressed ladies, and brilliant with a childish
eagerness to play off the showman. Many of
these grim fellow-creatures he declared he had
seen, played or fought with. He had something
true or false to say about each. In his high
spirits he contrived to make the tiger move, and
imitated the hiss of the terrible anaconda. All
that he did had its grace, its charm; and the buzz
of admiration and the flattering glances of ladies'
eyes followed him wherever he moved.

However, there was a general feeling of relief
when the mayor led the way from the museum
into the ball-room. In provincial parties guests
arrive pretty much within the same hour, and so
few who had once paid their respects to the apes
and serpents, the hippopotamus and the tiger,
were disposed to repeat the visit, that long
before eleven o’clock the museum was as free
from the intrusion of human life as the wilderness
in which its dead occupants had been born.

I had gone my round through the rooms, and,
little disposed to be social, had crept into the
retreat of a window-niche, pleased to think
myself screened by its draperies—not that I was
melancholy, far from it—for the letter I had
received that morning from Lilian had raised my
whole being into a sovereignty of happiness
high beyond the reach of the young pleasure-
hunters, whose voices and laughter blended with
that vulgar music.

To read her letter again I had stolen to my
nook—and, now, sure that none saw me kiss it, I
replaced it in my bosom. I looked through the
parted curtain; the room was comparatively
empty; but there, through the open folding-
doors, I saw the gay crowd gathered round the
dancers, and there again, at right angles, a vista
along the corridor afforded a glimpse of the great
elephant in the deserted museum.

Presently I heard, close beside me, my host’s
voice.

“Here’s a cool corner, a pleasant sofa, you
can have it all to yourself; what an honour to
receive you under my roof, and on this interesting
occasion! Yes, as you say, there are great changes
here since you left us. Society is much improved.
I must look about and find some persons to
introduce to you. Clever! oh, I know your tastes.
We have a wonderful man—a new doctor. Carries
all before him—very high character, too—good
old family—greatly looked up to, even apart from
his profession. Dogmatic a little—a Sir Oracle—
‘Lets no dog bark;’ you remember the quotation
—Shakespeare. Where on earth is he? My
dear Sir Philip, I am sure you would enjoy his
conversation.”

Sir Philip! Could it be Sir Philip Derval, to
whom the mayor was giving a flattering, yet
scarcely propitiatory, description of myself?
Curiosity combined with a sense of propriety in
not keeping myself an unsuspected listener: I
emerged from the curtain, but silently, and
reached the centre of the room before the mayor
perceived me. He then came up to me eagerly,
linked his arm in mine, and leading me to a
gentleman seated on a sofa, close by the window
I had quitted, said:

“Doctor, I must present you to Sir Philip
Derval, just returned to England, and not six
hours in L——. If you would like to see the
museum again, Sir Philip, the doctor, I am sure,
will accompany you.”

“No, I thank you; it is painful to me at
present, to see, even under your roof, the collection
which my poor dear friend, Dr. Lloyd, was so
proudly beginning to form when I left these
parts.”

“Ay, Sir Philip—Dr. Lloyd was a worthy
man in his way, but sadly duped in his latter
years; took to mesmerism, only think! But our
young doctor here showed him up, I can tell
you.”

Sir Philip, who had acknowledged my first
introduction to his acquaintance by the quiet
courtesy with which a well-bred man goes through a
ceremony that custom enables him to endure
with equal ease and indifference, now evinced
by a slight change of manner how little the
mayor’s reference to my dispute with Dr. Lloyd
advanced me in his good opinion. He turned
away with a bow more formal than his first one,
and said calmly:

“I regret to hear that a man so simple-
minded and so sensitive as Dr. Lloyd should
have provoked an encounter in which I can well
conceive him to have been worsted. With your
leave, Mr. Mayor, I will look into your ball-room.
I may perhaps find there some old acquaintances."

He walked towards the dancers, and the
mayor, linking his arm in mine, followed close
behind, saying, in his loud hearty tones,

“Come along, you, too, Dr. Fenwick, my girls
are there; you have not spoken to them yet.”

Sir Philip, who was then half way across the
room, turned round abruptly, and looking me
full in the face, said:

“Fenwick, is your name Fenwick?—Allen
Fenwick?”

“That is my name, Sir Philip.”

“Then permit me to shake you by the hand;
you are no stranger, and no mere acquaintance to
me. Mr. Mayor, we will look into your ball-room
later; do not let us keep you now from your
other guests.”

The mayor, not in the least offended by being
thus summarily dismissed, smiled, walked on,
and was soon lost amongst the crowd.

Sir Philip, still retaining my hand, re-seated
himself on the sofa, and I took my place by his
side. The room was still deserted: now and then
a straggler from the ball-room looked in for a
moment, and then sauntered back to the central
place of attraction.

“I am trying to guess,” said I, “how my
name should be known to you. Possibly you
may, in some visit to the Lakes, have known my
father?”

“No; I know none of your name but