general
belief that he was insane. So he was simply cashiered and obliged to
leave the service and betake himself elsewhere. Thus the girl whom, he
had married was quite free--free to leave her wretched home and even to
leave Ireland.

She did leave Ireland and establish herself in London, where she had
some acquaintances, among them the Earl of Blessington. As already
said, he had met her in Ireland while she was living with her husband;
and now from time to time he saw her in a friendly way. After the death
of his wife he became infatuated with Margaret Farmer. She was a good
deal alone, and his attentions gave her entertainment. Her past
experience led her to have no real belief in love. She had become,
however, in a small way interested in literature and art, with an eager
ambition to be known as a writer. As it happened, Captain Farmer, whose
name she bore, had died some months before Lord Blessington had decided
to make a new marriage. The earl proposed to Margaret Farmer, and the
two were married by special license.

The Countess of Blessington--to give the lady her new title--was now
twenty-eight years of age and had developed into a woman of great
beauty. She was noted for the peculiarly vivacious and radiant
expression which was always on her face. She had a kind of vivid
loveliness accompanied by grace, simplicity, and a form of exquisite
proportions. The ugly duckling had become a swan, for now there was no
trace of her former plainness to be seen.

Not yet in her life had love come to her. Her first husband had been
thrust upon her and had treated her outrageously. Her second husband
was much older than she; and, though she was not without a certain
kindly feeling for one who had been kind to her, she married him, first
of all, for his title and position.

Having been reared in poverty, she had no conception of the value of
money; and, though the earl was remarkably extravagant, the new
countess was even more so. One after another their London houses were
opened and decorated with the utmost lavishness. They gave innumerable
entertainments, not only to the nobility and to men of rank,
but--because this was Lady Blessington's peculiar fad--to artists and
actors and writers of all degrees. The American, N. P. Willis, in his
Pencilings by the Way, has given an interesting sketch of the countess
and her surroundings, while the younger Disraeli (Lord Beaconsfield)
has depicted D'Orsay as Count Mirabel in He