the college too hot for him. In a week I had
every man in the place with me, and things came to such a pass that
all of us must be sent down, or Valiant resign. He resigned. He found
another professorship; but the thing followed him, and he was obliged to
leave the country."

When I finished the story, Mrs. Falchion was silent for a time, then,
with a slight air of surprise, and in a quite critical way, she said:
"I should think you would act very well, if you used less emotion. Mrs.
Valiant had a kind of courage, but she was foolish to die. She should
have stayed and fought him--fought him every way, until she was his
master. She could have done it; she was clever, I should think. Still,
if she had to die, it was better to go with a good horse that way. I
think I should prefer to go swiftly, suddenly, but without the horror
of blood and bruises, and that sort of thing.... I should like to meet
Professor Valiant. He was hard, but he was able too.... But haven't
we had enough of horror? I asked you to amuse me, and you have merely
interested me instead. Oh!--"

This exclamation, I thought, was caused by the voice of the
quartermaster humming:

"I'm a-sailing, I'm a-sailing on the sea,
To a harbour where the wind is still"--

Almost immediately she said: "I think I will go below." Then, after a
slight pause: "This is a liberal acquaintance for one day, Dr. Marmion;
and, you know, we were not introduced."

"No, Mrs. Falchion, we were not introduced; but I am in some regards
your host, and I fear we should all be very silent if we waited for
regular introductions here. The acquaintance gives me pleasure, but it
is not nearly so liberal as I hope it may become."

She did not answer, but smiled at me over her shoulder as she passed
down the staircase, and the next instant I could have bitten my tongue
for playing the cavalier as I had done; for showing, as I think I did,
that she had an influence over me--an influence peculiar to herself, and
difficult to account for when not in her presence.

I sat down, lit a cigar, and went over in my mind all that had been said
between us; all that had occurred in my cabin after dinner; every minute
since we left Colombo was laid bare to its minutest detail. Lascars
slipped by me in the half-darkness, the voices of two lovers near
alternated with their expressive silences, and from the music saloon
there came the pretty strains of a minuet, played very deftly. Unde