d representing the wealth of the
country, yet had not started one respectable journal that a lady could
read through without offence to her, or a gentleman without disgust! If
there was not one English newspaper in existence independent of
circulation and advertisements, and of the tricks to win them, the Tories
were answerable for the vacancy. They, being the rich who, if they chose,
could set an example to our Press by subscribing to maintain a Journal
superior to the flattering of vile appetites--'all that nauseous matter,'
Beauchamp stretched his fingers at the sheets Colonel Halkett was
holding, and which he had not read--'those Tories,' he bowed to the
colonel, 'I'm afraid I must say you, sir, are answerable for it.'

'I am very well satisfied with my paper,' said the colonel.

Beauchamp sighed to himself. 'We choose to be satisfied,' he said. His
pure and mighty DAWN was in his thoughts: the unborn light of a day
denied to earth!

One of the doctors of Bevisham, visiting a sick maid of the house,
trotted up the terrace to make his report to her master of the state of
her health. He hoped to pull her through with the aid of high feeding. He
alluded cursorily to a young girl living on the outskirts of the town,
whom he had been called in to see at the eleventh hour, and had lost,
owing to the lowering of his patient from a prescription of a vegetable
diet by a certain Dr. Shrapnel.

That ever-explosive name precipitated Beauchamp to the front rank of the
defence.

'I happen to be staying with Dr. Shrapnel,' he observed. 'I don't eat
meat there because he doesn't, and I am certain I take no harm by
avoiding it. I think vegetarianism a humaner system, and hope it may be
wise. I should like to set the poor practising it, for their own sakes;
and I have half an opinion that it would be good for the rich--if we are
to condemn gluttony.'

'Ah? Captain Beauchamp!' the doctor bowed to him. 'But my case was one of
poor blood requiring to be strengthened. The girl was allowed to sink so
low that stimulants were ineffective when I stepped in. There's the
point. It 's all very well while you are in health. You may do without
meat till your system demands the stimulant, or else--as with this poor
girl! And, indeed, Captain Beauchamp, if I may venture the remark--I had
the pleasure of seeing you during the last Election in our town--and if I
may be so bold, I should venture to hint that the avoidance of animal
food--to ju