you promise me to wear it, though you
will look like a bear? How d'ye do, Mr. Cutbill?"

"I'm bobbish, miss, thank you. And you?" "I don't exactly know if I'm
bobbish, but I'm certainly in good spirits, for I have heard from some
very dear friends, who are on their way to see, and spend the Christmas
with us."

L'Estrange turned a sudden glance on Cutbill. It was a mere glance, but
it said more than words, and was so inexpressibly sad besides, that the
other muttered a hurried good-bye and left them.

CHAPTER XLII. A LONG TETE-A-TETE

Pracontal and Longworth sat at breakfast at Freytag's Hotel at Rome.
They were splendidly lodged, and the table was spread with all the
luxury and abundance which are usually displayed where well-paying guests
are treated by wise inn-keepers. Fruit and flowers decorated the board,
arranged as a painter's eye might have suggested, and nothing was
wanting that could gratify the sense of sight or tempt the palate.

"After all," said Longworth, "your song-writer blundered when he wrote
'l'amour.' It is 'l'argent' that 'makes the world go round.' Look at
that table, and say what sunshine the morning breaks with, when one
doesn't fret about the bill."

"You are right, O Philip," said the other. "Let people say what they
may, men love those who spend money. See what a popularity follows the
Empire in France, and what is its chief claim? Just what you said a
moment back. It never frets about the bill. Contrast the splendor
of such a Government with the mean mercantile spirit of your British
Parliament, higgling over contracts and cutting down clerks' salaries,
as though the nation were glorified when its servants wore broken boots
and patched pantaloons."

"The world needs spendthrifts as it needs tornadoes. The whirlwind
purifies even as it devastates."

"How grand you are at an aphorism, Philip! You have all the pomp of the
pulpit when you deliver a mere platitude."

"To a Frenchman, everything is a platitude that is not a paradox."

"Go on, your vein is wonderful this morning."

"A Frenchman is the travesty of human nature; every sentiment of his is
the parody of what it ought to be. He is grave over trifles and evokes
mirth out of the deepest melancholy; he takes sweet wine with his
oysters, and when the post has brought him letters that may actually
decide his destiny, he throws them aside to read a critique on the
last ballet, or revive his recollections of its delight by