"Tribkin!" he exclaimed. "My dear fellow, I-I—I really- Upon my word, I—I——” He broke off confused, and exchanged uneasy glances with his friend. I watched his discomfort keenly, in that special way that the snake, according to novelists, watches the fascinated sparrow.

"I overheard your remarks, my lord," I said in a sort of stage whisper, accentuated by much stuttering severity. "I overheard-unintentionally and with pain - your remarks concerning my-my wife! I need scarcely say that they were not agreeable to me. I consider I most emphatically consider, sir, that you owe me an apology!"

"My dear Tribkin," and the young man eagerly extended his hand, "pray let me make it at once! I apologise most sincerely, most penitently. I am awfully sorry, really! My friend here, Mr. Herbert Vaughan, is as sorry as I am, I'm sure, aren't you, Vaughan?" The gentleman appealed to, who had been diligently sorting crumbs on the table-cloth, looked up with a burning blush, bowed low, and acquiesced. "It's very foolish to get talking about-about people, you know; one can never be certain that they are not close at hand. I hope you forgive me! I really didn't mean

Here I cut him short; he was evidently so sincerely grieved and vexed that my anger cooled down completely, and I pressed his proffered hand.

"That's enough," I said dismally, but gently too. "I know people will talk, and I suppose Mrs. Tribkin" -here I brightened up a bit-"is handsome enough and clever enough to be talked about!”

"Exactly," and the young earl looked immensely relieved at this way of putting it. "That's what Georgie always says. You know I'm going to marry Georgie?" "I know," I replied, "and I congratulate you!"

"Thanks! Now do have a glass of wine, won't you? Here, waiter, bring another bottle of Beaune.”

I was half disposed to decline this invitation, but he pressed me so cordially that I could not very well refuse. I therefore sat down, and we all, including the young gentleman named Vaughan, conversed for some time on the subject of Woman generally-woman judged from two points of view, namely, the high and dignified position which Nature evidently intended her to occupy, and the exceedingly cheap and low level at which she, in these modern days, seems inclined to place herself. It may and it will no doubt surprise many fair readers of these unpretending pages to learn that, taken the majority of opinion held by the best and bravest men of England (and by the best and bravest I mean those who have their country's good at heart, who revere their Queen, and who have not yet trampled chivalry in the dust and made a jest of honour), it will be found that they are unanimous in wishing to keep sweet woman in

her proper sphere; a sphere, I may add, which is by no means narrow, but, on the contrary, wide enough to admit all things gracious, becoming and beautiful; inspiring things both in art and loftiest literature; things that tend to refine, but not to degrade and vulgarize. Men have no sort of objection to make when women, gifted with a rare and subtle power of intellect, take to the study of high philosophy and glorious science; if, like Mary Somerville, they can turn their bright eyes undismayed on the giddy wonders of the firmament and expound in musical phrase the glittering riddles of astronomy, we hear them with as much reverence and honour as though they were wise angels speaking. If, like Elizabeth Barrett, they pour from a full sweet heart such poetry as is found in the "Sonnets from the Portuguese," we listen entranced and moved to the lovely music that "Gentlier on the spirit lies, Than tired eyelids upon tired eyes." Who does not admire and revere the woman who wrote the following exquisite lines which, with all their passion, are still true womanly:

"How do I love thee? Let me count the ways:
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and Ideal Grace;
I love thee to the level of every day's

Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight;
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right,
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise;

I love thee with the passion put to use

In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith:
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose

With my lost saints,-I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears of all my life!—and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death!"

In fine, we-I speak for the men-we do not want to shut out woman from what she can becomingly do without destroying the indefinable soft attraction of her womanhood. But when she wishes to vulgarize herself; when instead of a queen she elects to be a street scavenger or the driver of a dust cart, we object. We object for her sake quite as much as for our own; because we know what the direful result of such a state of topsey-turveydom must infallibly be. When women voluntarily resign their position as the silent monitors and models of grace and purity, down will go all the pillars of society, and we shall scarcely differ in our manners and customs from the nations we call "barbaric," because as yet they have not adopted Christ's exalted idea of the value and sanctity of female influence on the higher development of the human race.

But I am getting serious-too serious to be borne with by the impatient readers of to-day. All the same, we must be serious sometimes; we cannot always be grinning about like apes among cocoa-nut trees. There's too much grinning nowadays-false grinning, I mean. We grin at our friends, grin straight through the length

The Hired Baby, etc,

9

and breadth of an "at home," grin in church and out of church, grin at scandals, grin at suicides, grin at everything, everywhere. We might as well be death's heads at once and have done with it. We shall be some day; but I fancy we are rather anticipating the pleasure!

When I got home that evening I did not fail to report to my wife the faithful account of my meeting with the Earl of Richmoor and his friend Mr. Vaughan, and what they had said, and what I had said about her and about her sex generally. She heard me with that admirable equanimity which always distinguished her, but it made no effect upon her.

"Richmoor's a prig," she said curtly. "He always was, you know. One of those dreadfully stuck-up, blueblood, long-lineage fellows. Bobbie is nothing to him." ("Bobbie" was the "boy" with the moustaches; scrape his gills and cook him for dinner, I mused dreamily.) "And so you said I was handsome and clever enough to be talked about, did you?”

"I did."

"Well now, old boy, that was awfully nice of you," and she gave me a bright smile. "Husbands are not always so complimentary behind their wives' backs. You deserve a reward, and I'm going to give it to you! You shall get rid of me for a whole six weeks; there!"