your humble servant, Miss Herbert, and hints that he has
received one hundred parses from the sheiks of the Lebanon not to
reach the Golden Horn before they have made their peace with the Grand
Vizier."

"And is of course untrue?"

"Of course, every word of it is a falsehood; but there are _gobemouches_
will believe anything. Mark my words, and see if this allegation be not
heard in the House of Commons, and some Tower Hamlets member start up
to ask if the Foreign Secretary will lay on the table copies of the
instructions given to a certain person, and supposed to be credentials
of a nature to supersede the functions of our ambassador at the Porte.
In confidence, between ourselves, Miss Herbert, so they are! I am
intrusted with full powers about the Hatti Homayoun, as the world shall
see in good time."

"Do you take your tea strong?" asked she; and there was something so odd
and so inopportune in the question, that I felt it as a sort of covert
sneer; but when I looked up and beheld that pale and gentle face
turned towards me, I banished the base suspicion, and forgetting all my
enthusiasm, said,--

"Yes, dearest; strong as brandy!"

She tried to look grave, perhaps angry; but in spite of herself, she
burst out a-laughing.

"I perceive, sir," said she, "that Mrs. Keats was quite correct when she
said that you appear to have moments in which you are unaware of what
you say."

Before I could rally to reply, she had poured out a cup of tea for Mrs.
Keats, and left the room to carry it to her.

"'Moments in which I am unaware of what I say,'--'incoherent intervals'
Forbes Winslow would call them: in plain English, I am mad. Old woman,
have you dared to cast such an aspersion on me, and to disparage me,
too, in the quarter where I am striving to achieve success? For her
opinion of me I am less than indifferent; for her Judgment of my
capacity, my morals, my manners, I am as careless as I well can be of
anything; but these become serious disparagements when they reach
the ears of one whose heart I would make my own. I will insist on an
explanation--no, but an apology--for this. She shall declare that she
used these words in some non-natural sense,--that I am the sanest of
mortals: she shall give it under her hand and seal: 'I, the undersigned,
having in a moment of rash and impatient Judgment imputed to the bearer
of this document, Algernon Sydney Potts,'--no, Pottinger--ha, there is a
difficulty! If I be Pottinger