ouldn't be any nearer to salmon-fishing and deer-forests that way, or
to the people who possess these by birth and inheritance. The trouble
with you, Linn, my boy, as with most of us, is that you weren't born in
the purple. It is quite true that if you were called to the bar you
could properly claim the title of esquire, and you would find yourself
not further down than the hundred and fiftieth or hundred and sixtieth
section in the tables of precedence; but if you went with this
qualification to those fine friends of yours, they would admit its
validity, and let you know at the same time you were no longer
interesting to them. Harry Thornhill, of the New Theatre, has a free
passport everywhere; Mr. Lionel Moore, of the Middle Temple, wouldn't be
wanted anywhere."

"You are very worldly-wise to-night, Maurice."

"I don't want to see you make a sacrifice that wouldn't bring you what
you expect to gain by it," Mangan said. "But, as I say, you won't make
any such sacrifice. You have had your brain turned by a pretty pair of
eyes--perhaps by an elegant figure--and you have been troubled and
dissatisfied and dreaming dreams."

"If that is your conclusion and summing-up of the whole matter," Lionel
said, with studied indifference, "perhaps you will offer me a drink, and
I'll have a cigarette, and we can talk about something on which we are
likely to agree."

"I'm sure I beg your pardon," Mangan said, with a laugh; and he went and
brought forth what modest stores he had, and he was quite willing that
the conversation should flow into another channel.

And little did Lionel know that at this very moment there was something
awaiting him at his own rooms that would (far more effectually than any
reasoning and plain speaking) banish from his mind, for the moment at
least, all those restless aspirations and vague regrets. When eventually
he arrived in Piccadilly and went up-stairs, he was not expecting any
letters, this being Sunday; and as there was on the table only a small
parcel, he would probably have left that unheeded till the morning (no
doubt it was a pair of worked slippers, or a couple of ivory-backed
brushes, or something of the kind) but that in passing he happened to
glance at the note on the top of it, and he observed that the
handwriting was foreign. He took it up carelessly and opened it; his
carelessness soon vanished. The message was from Mlle. Girond, and it
was in French:

"DEAR MR. MOORE,--To-day M