is!"

The full-bodied angel ceremoniously bowed to her, and acted with reserved
unction the benefactor he saw in their greetings. "I think we are not
strangers," he was good enough to remark, and very quickly let them know
he had not breakfasted; on hearing which they hurried him into the house,
and Lucy put herself in motion to have him served.

"Dear old Rady," said Richard, tugging at his hand again, "how glad I am
you've come! I don't mind telling you we've been horridly wretched."

"Six, seven, eight, nine eggs," was Adrian's comment on a survey of the
breakfast-table.

"Why wouldn't he write? Why didn't he answer one of my letters? But here
you are, so I don't mind now. He wants to see us, does he? We'll go up
to-night. I've a match on at eleven; my little yacht--I've called her the
'Blandish'--against Fred Cuirie's 'Begum.' I shall beat, but whether I do
or not, we'll go up to-night. What's the news? What are they all doing?"

"My dear boy!" Adrian returned, sitting comfortably down, "let me put
myself a little more on an equal footing with you before I undertake to
reply. Half that number of eggs will be sufficient for an unmarried man,
and then we'll talk. They're all very well, as well as I can recollect
after the shaking my total vacuity has had this morning. I came over by
the first boat, and the sea, the sea has made me love mother earth, and
desire of her fruits."

Richard fretted restlessly opposite his cool relative.

"Adrian! what did he say when he heard of it? I want to know exactly what
words he said."

"Well says the sage, my son! 'Speech is the small change of Silence.' He
said less than I do."

"That's how he took it!" cried Richard, and plunged in meditation.

Soon the table was cleared, and laid out afresh, and Lucy preceded the
maid bearing eggs on the tray, and sat down unbonneted, and like a
thorough-bred housewife, to pour out the tea for him.

"Now we'll commence," said Adrian, tapping his egg with meditative
cheerfulness; but his expression soon changed to one of pain, all the
more alarming for his benevolent efforts to conceal it. Could it be
possible the egg was bad? oh, horror! Lucy watched him, and waited in
trepidation.

"This egg has boiled three minutes and three-quarters," he observed,
ceasing to contemplate it.

"Dear, dear!" said Lucy, "I boiled them myself exactly that time. Richard
likes them so. And you like them hard, Mr. Harley?"

"On the contrary, I like t