than the
whole,"--taken from time, or rather eternity.

CHAPTER VI.

Agreeably to the usual custom in great houses, as soon as I arrived at
Compton I was conducted to my room to adjust my toilet or compose my
spirits by solitude,--it wanted an hour to dinner. I had not, however,
been thus left ten minutes before the door opened and Trevanion himself
(as I would fain still call him) stood before me. Most cordial were his
greeting and welcome; and seating himself by my side, he continued
to converse in his peculiar way--bluntly eloquent and carelessly
learned--till the half-hour bell rang. He talked on Australia, the
Wakefield system, cattle, books, his trouble in arranging his library,
his schemes for improving his property and embellishing his grounds, his
delight to find my father look so well, his determination to see a great
deal of him, whether his old college friend would or not; he talked, in
short, of everything except politics and his own past career,--showing
only his soreness in that silence. But--independently of the mere work
of time--he looked yet more worn and jaded in his leisure than he had
done in the full tide of business; and his former abrupt quickness of
manner now seemed to partake of feverish excitement. I hoped that my
father would see much of him, for I felt that the weary mind wanted
soothing.

Just as the second bell rang I entered the drawing-room. There were
at least twenty guests present,--each guest, no doubt, some planet of
fashion or fame, with satellites of its own. But I saw only two
forms distinctly: first, Lord Castleton, conspicuous with star and
garter,--somewhat ampler and portlier in proportions, and with a frank
dash of gray in the silky waves of his hair, but still as pre-eminent
as ever for that beauty, the charm of which depends less than any
other upon youth, arising, as it does, from a felicitous combination
of bearing and manner, and that exquisite suavity of expression
which steals into the heart and pleases so much that it be comes a
satisfaction to admire! Of Lord Castleton, indeed, it might be said, as
of Alcibiades, "that he was beautiful at every age." I felt my breath
come thick, and a mist passed before my eyes as Lord Castleton led
me through the crowd, and the radiant vision of Fanny Trevanion--how
altered, and how dazzling!--burst upon me.

I felt the light touch of that hand of snow; but no guilty thrill shot
through my veins. I heard the voice, musi