as passionately given) approached the demesne. I thrust the
written confession into that volume of Cicero, hurried to the stable,
saddled my horse with my own hands, and rode in the direction whence I
heard the music of the hounds. On my way a locked gate barred my
progress. I put Rupert at it, he took off badly, fell, and my spirit
passed away in the fall. But not to the place of repose did my sinful
spirit wing its flight. I found myself here in the library, where,
naturally, scarcely any one ever comes except the maids. When I would
implore them to destroy the unholy document that binds me to earth, they
merely scream; nor have I found any scion of the house, nor any guest,
except your lordship, of more intrepid resolution or more charitable
mood. And now, I trust, you will release me.'

"I rose (for I had seated myself during his narrative), my heart was
stirred with pity; I took down the Cicero, and lit on a sheet of yellow
paper covered with faded manuscript, which, of course, I did not read. I
turned to the hearth, tossed on the fire the sere old paper, which blazed
at once, and then, hearing the words pax vobiscum, I looked round. But I
was alone. After a few minutes, devoted to private ejaculations, I
returned to the dining-room; and that is all my story. Your maids need
no longer dread the ghost of the library. He is released."

"Will any one take any more wine?" asked Lord Birkenhead, in tones of
deep emotion. "No? Then suppose we join the ladies."

"Well," said one of the ladies, the Girton girl, when the squire had
finished the prelate's narrative, "_I_ don't call that much of a story.
What was Lady Birkenhead's confession about? That's what one really
wants to know."

"The bishop could not possibly have read the paper," said the Bachelor of
Arts, one of the guests; "not as a gentleman, nor a bishop."

"I wish _I_ had had the chance," said the Girton girl.

"Perhaps the confession was in Latin," said the Bachelor of Arts.

The Girton girl disdained to reply to this unworthy sneer.

"I have often observed," she said in a reflective voice, "that the most
authentic and best attested bogies don't come to very much. They appear
in a desultory manner, without any context, so to speak, and, like other
difficulties, require a context to clear up their meaning."

These efforts of the Girton girl to apply the methods of philology to
spectres, were received in silence. The women did not unders