all down to the ground laid hold of the
garden and the flowers, and by double and treble reflection filled the
room with delightful nooks of verdure and color.

Here are the words in which Reade describes himself as he looked when
between fifty and sixty years of age:

He looked neither like a poet nor a drudge, but a great fat country
farmer. He was rather tall, very portly, smallish head, commonplace
features, mild brown eye not very bright, short beard, and wore a suit
of tweed all one color.

Such was the house and such was the man over both of which Laura
Seymour held sway until her death in 1879. What must be thought of their
relations? She herself once said to Mr. John Coleman:

"As for our positions--his and mine--we are partners, nothing more. He
has his bank-account, and I have mine. He is master of his fellowship
and his rooms at Oxford, and I am mistress of this house, but not his
mistress! Oh, dear, no!"

At another time, long after Mr. Seymour's death, she said to an intimate
friend:

"I hope Mr. Reade will never ask me to marry him, for I should certainly
refuse the offer."

There was no reason why he should not have made this offer, because his
Oxford fellowship ceased to be important to him after he had won fame as
a novelist. Publishers paid him large sums for everything he wrote. His
debts were all paid off, and his income was assured. Yet he never spoke
of marriage, and he always introduced his friend as "the lady who keeps
my house for me."

As such, he invited his friends to meet her, and as such, she even
accompanied him to Oxford. There was no concealment, and apparently
there was nothing to conceal. Their manner toward each other was that of
congenial friends. Mrs. Seymour, in fact, might well have been described
as "a good fellow." Sometimes she referred to him as "the doctor," and
sometimes by the nickname "Charlie." He, on his side, often spoke of her
by her last name as "Seymour," precisely as if she had been a man. One
of his relatives rather acutely remarked about her that she was not a
woman of sentiment at all, but had a genius for friendship; and that she
probably could not have really loved any man at all.

This is, perhaps, the explanation of their intimacy. If so, it is a very
remarkable instance of Platonic friendship. It is certain that, after
she met Reade, Mrs. Seymour never cared for any other man. It is no less
certain that he never cared for any other woman. When sh