guard those entrusted by nature and fate to my especial
care. And surely, if among all my fellow-creatures I were to select those
who might stand forth examples of the greatness and goodness of man, I
could choose no other than those allied to me by the most sacred ties. Some
from among the family of man must survive, and these should be among the
survivors; that should be my task--to accomplish it my own life were a
small sacrifice. There then in that castle--in Windsor Castle,
birth-place of Idris and my babes, should be the haven and retreat for the
wrecked bark of human society. Its forest should be our world--its garden
afford us food; within its walls I would establish the shaken throne of
health. I was an outcast and a vagabond, when Adrian gently threw over me
the silver net of love and civilization, and linked me inextricably to
human charities and human excellence. I was one, who, though an aspirant
after good, and an ardent lover of wisdom, was yet unenrolled in any list
of worth, when Idris, the princely born, who was herself the
personification of all that was divine in woman, she who walked the earth
like a poet's dream, as a carved goddess endued with sense, or pictured
saint stepping from the canvas--she, the most worthy, chose me, and gave
me herself--a priceless gift.

During several hours I continued thus to meditate, till hunger and fatigue
brought me back to the passing hour, then marked by long shadows cast from
the descending sun. I had wandered towards Bracknel, far to the west of
Windsor. The feeling of perfect health which I enjoyed, assured me that I
was free from contagion. I remembered that Idris had been kept in ignorance
of my proceedings. She might have heard of my return from London, and my
visit to Bolter's Lock, which, connected with my continued absence, might
tend greatly to alarm her. I returned to Windsor by the Long Walk, and
passing through the town towards the Castle, I found it in a state of
agitation and disturbance.

"It is too late to be ambitious," says Sir Thomas Browne. "We cannot hope
to live so long in our names as some have done in their persons; one face
of Janus holds no proportion to the other." Upon this text many fanatics
arose, who prophesied that the end of time was come. The spirit of
superstition had birth, from the wreck of our hopes, and antics wild and
dangerous were played on the great theatre, while the remaining particle of
futurity dwindled into a point