ry requested. His nomination in chief among the
traditionally very merry Islanders was hardly borne out by the tale of
his enchainment with a drunken yokefellow--unless upon the Durance
version of the felicity of his countrymen; still, the water-wagtail
carried it, Skepsey trotted into memories. Heroes conducted up Fame's
temple-steps by ceremonious historians, who are studious, when the
platform is reached, of the art of setting them beneath the flambeau of a
final image, before thrusting them inside to be rivetted on their
pedestals, have an excellent chance of doing the same, let but the
provident narrators direct that image to paint the thing a moth-like
humanity desires, in the thing it shrinks from. Miss Priscilla Graves now
fastened her meditations upon Skepsey; and it was important to him.

Tobacco withdrew the haunting shadow of the Rev. Septimus Barmby from
Nesta. She strolled beside Louise de Seilles, to breathe sweet-sweet in
the dear friend's ear and tell her she loved her. The presence of the
German had, without rousing animosity, damped the young Frenchwoman, even
to a revulsion when her feelings had been touched by hearing praise of
her France, and wounded by the subjects of the praise. She bore the
national scar, which is barely skin-clothing of a gash that will not heal
since her country was overthrown and dismembered. Colney Durance could
excuse the unreasonableness in her, for it had a dignity, and she
controlled it, and quietly suffered, trusting to the steady, tireless,
concentrated aim of her France. In the Gallic mind of our time, France
appears as a prematurely buried Glory, that heaves the mound oppressing
breath and cannot cease; and calls hourly, at times keenly, to be
remembered, rescued from the pain and the mould-spots of that foul
sepulture. Mademoiselle and Colney were friends, partly divided by her
speaking once of revanche; whereupon he assumed the chair of the
Moralist, with its right to lecture, and went over to the enemy; his talk
savoured of a German. Our holding of the balance, taking two sides, is
incomprehensible to a people quivering with the double wound to body and
soul. She was of Breton blood. Cymric enough was in Nesta to catch any
thrill from her and join to her mood, if it hung out a colour sad or gay,
and was noble, as any mood of this dear Louise would surely be.

Nataly was not so sympathetic. Only the Welsh and pure Irish are quick at
the feelings of the Celtic Frenc