tion. Now to animate The Man of Two Minds!

He is courting, but he is burdened with the task of tasks. He has an
ideal of womanhood and of the union of couples: a delicacy extreme as his
attachment: and he must induce the lady to school herself to his ideal,
not allowing her to suspect him less devoted to her person; while she, an
exacting idol, will drink any quantity of idealization as long as he
starts it from a full acceptance of her acknowledged qualities. Diana
could once have tripped the scene along airily. She stared at the opening
sentence, a heavy bit of moralized manufacture, fit to yoke beside that
on her view of her bank-book.

'It has come to this--I have no head,' she cried.

And is our public likely to muster the slightest taste for comic analysis
that does not tumble to farce? The doubt reduced her whole MS. to a
leaden weight, composed for sinking. Percy's addiction to burlesque was a
further hindrance, for she did not perceive how her comedy could be
strained to gratify it.

There was a knock, and Danvers entered. 'You have apparently a liking for
late hours,' observed her mistress. 'I told you to go to bed.' 'It is Mr.
Dacier,' said Danvers. 'He wishes to see me?' 'Yes, ma'am. He apologized
for disturbing you.' 'He must have some good reason.' What could it be!
Diana's glass approved her appearance. She pressed the black swell of
hair above her temples, rather amazed, curious, inclined to a beating of
the heart.

CHAPTER XXXI

A CHAPTER CONTAINING GREAT POLITICAL NEWS AND THEREWITH AN INTRUSION OF
THE LOVE-GOD

Dacier was pacing about the drawing-room, as in a place too narrow for
him.

Diana stood at the door. 'Have you forgotten to tell me anything I ought
to know?'

He came up to her and shut the door softly behind her, holding her hand.
'You are near it. I returned . . But tell me first:--You were slightly
under a shadow this evening, dejected.'

'Did I show it?'

She was growing a little suspicious, but this cunning touch of lover-like
interest dispersed the shade.

'To me you did.'

'It was unpardonable to let it be seen.'

'No one else could have observed it.'

Her woman's heart was thrilled; for she had concealed the dejection from
Emma.

'It was nothing,' she said; 'a knot in the book I am writing. We poor
authors are worried now and then. But you?'

His face rippled by degrees brightly, to excite a reflection in hers.

'Shall I tune you with good news? I think