d came back to me and in the shape of Woman the
Inevitable. Probably it was so decreed since is it not written that no
man can live to himself alone, or lose himself in watching and nurturing
the growth of his own soul?

It happened thus. I went to Rome on my way home from India, and stayed
there a while. On the day after my arrival I wrote my name in the book
of our Minister to Italy at that time, Sir Alfred Upton, not because I
wished him to ask me to dinner, but for the reason that I had heard of
him as a man of archeological tastes and thought that he might enable me
to see things which otherwise I should not see.

As it chanced he knew about me through some of my Devonshire neighbours
who were friends of his, and did ask me to dinner on the following
night. I accepted and found myself one of a considerable party, some of
them distinguished English people who wore Orders, as is customary when
one dines with the representative of our Sovereign. Seeing these, and
this shows that in the best of us vanity is only latent, for the first
time in my life I was sorry that I had none and was only plain Mr.
Arbuthnot who, as Sir Alfred explained to me politely, must go in to
dinner last, because all the rest had titles, and without even a lady as
there was not one to spare.

Nor was my lot bettered when I got there, as I found myself seated
between an Italian countess and a Russian prince, neither of whom could
talk English, while, alas, I knew no foreign language, not even French
in which they addressed me, seeming surprised that I did not understand
them. I was humiliated at my own ignorance, although in fact I was not
ignorant, only my education had been classical. Indeed I was a good
classic and had kept up my knowledge more or less, especially since I
became an idle man. In my confusion it occurred to me that the Italian
countess might know Latin from which her own language was derived, and
addressed her in that tongue. She stared, and Sir Alfred, who was not
far off and overheard me (he also knew Latin), burst into laughter and
proceeded to explain the joke in a loud voice, first in French and
then in English, to the assembled company, who all became infected with
merriment and also stared at me as a curiosity.

Then it was that for the first time I saw Natalie, for owing to
a mistake of my driver I had arrived rather late and had not been
introduced to her. As her father's only daughter, her mother being dead,
she