f a jest. "The Sacred College," I heard him remark one day, "has
fifty centres of gravity. I sometimes fear that I am its centre of
levity." He was also fond of music. He was also fond of snuff:

"'T is an abominable habit," he admitted. "I can't tolerate it at
all--in others. When I was Bishop of Cittareggio, I discountenanced
it utterly among my clergy. But for myself--I need not say there are
special circumstances. Oddly enough, by the bye, at Cittareggio each
separate member of my clergy was able to plead special circumstances
for himself I have tried to give it up, and the effort has spoiled
my temper--turned me into a perfect old shrew. For my friends' sake,
therefore, I appease myself with an occasional pinch. You see, tobacco
is antiseptic. It's an excellent preservative of the milk of human
kindness."

The friends in question kept him supplied with sound rappee. Jests and
music he was abundantly competent to supply himself. He played the piano
and the organ, and he sang--in a clear, sweet, slightly faded tenor. Of
secular composers his favourites were "the lucid Scarlatti, the luminous
Bach." But the music that roused him to enthusiasm was Gregorian. He
would have none other at St. Mary of the Lilies. He had trained his
priests and his people there to sing it admirably--you should have heard
them sing Vespers; and he sang it admirably himself--you should have
heard him sing a Mass--you should have heard that sweet old tenor voice
of his in the Preface and the Pater Noster.

So, then, Beatrice stood before a pier-glass, and studied her new hat;
whilst the Cardinal, amused, indulgent, sat in his high-backed armchair,
and watched her.

"Well--? What do you think?" she asked, turning towards him.

"You appeal to me as an expert?" he questioned.

His speaking-voice, as well as his singing-voice, was sweet, but with
a kind of trenchant edge upon it, a genial asperity, that gave it
character, tang.

"As one who should certainly be able to advise," said she.

"Well, then--" said he. He took his chin into his hand, as if it were
a beard, and looked up at her, considering; and the lines of
amusement--the "parentheses"--deepened at either side of his mouth.
"Well, then, I think if the feather were to be lifted a little higher in
front, and brought down a little lower behind--"

"Good gracious, I don't mean my hat," cried Beatrice. "What in the world
can an old dear like you know about hats?"

There was a fur