Tresilyan. Shall I
send it to the 'United Service Gazette?' It would be a great credit to
our branch of the profession. No dragoon has published a rhyme since
Lovelace, I believe. I've got as far as the first line:

Ah, Cecil! hide those eyes of blue."

"I think I've heard something very like that before," Fanny answered,
laughing. "She deserves a prettier compliment than a _rechauffe_."

"Have you heard it before? Well, I shouldn't wonder. You don't expect
one to be original and enthusiastic at the same moment, when both are
out of one's line? I own it, though. Your princess merits all the
vassalage she has found--better than she will meet with here--if only
for the perfection of her costume. That _is_ a triumph. Honor to the
artist who built her hat. I drink to him now, and I wish the Burgundy
were worthier of the toast. (Hal, this Corton does not improve.) I
should advise you to secure the address of her _bottier_. You know her
well enough to ask for it, perhaps? It must be a secret."

"Then you have not found out how very clever she is?"

"Pardon me," was the reply; "I can imagine Miss Tresilyan perfectly well
educated; so well, that she might dispense with carrying about a living
voucher in the shape of that dreadful _ex-institutrice_. I never knew
what makes very nice women cling so to very disagreeable governesses.
Perhaps there is a satisfaction in patronizing where you have been
ruled, and in conferring favors where you have only received
'impositions'--a pleasant consciousness of returning good for evil.
There is no other rational way of accounting for it."

_La mignonne_ was not indignant now, as might have been expected; but
she gazed at the speaker long and more searchingly than was her wont,
with something very like pity in her kind, earnest eyes.

"I suppose you would not sneer so at every thing if you could help it,"
she said. "I am not wise enough to do so; but I don't envy you."

Royston's hard cold face changed for an instant, and the faintest flush
lingered there, about as long as your breath would upon polished steel.
It was not the first time that one of her random shafts had struck him
home. All the sarcasm had died out of his voice as he answered slowly--

"Don't you envy me? You are right there. And you think you are not wise
enough to be cynical? If there was any school to teach us how to turn
our talents to the best account, I know which of us two would have most
to learn." When he