ing into her carriage to return home, when suddenly
he appeared at her side and assisting her into it, entreated, "Fair
queen, permit the humblest of your most loyal subjects the honor of
escorting you to the palace." She assented, and the carriage had no
sooner started than in a voice, trembling with earnestness, he added.
"and permit me to ask if your command this evening was merely an
exercise of power, or did a deeper meaning lie therein?"

"I did mean to warn you," said Emma, gently, "that there was poison in
the glass--slow, perchance, but sure."

"And do you think _me_ in danger, Miss Leslie?"

"I think all in danger who do not adopt the rule of total abstinance;
and, pardon me, if I say that with your excitable temperament, I
imagine you to be in more than ordinary peril."

There was a long pause. When he spoke again his tones were calmer.

"I did not imagine I could ever become a slave to appetite. Often,
while suffering from the fatigue induced by writing, I have taken
brandy, and been revived by it. Sometimes before going to speak in
public I have felt the need of artificial stimulus to invigorate my
shattered nerves. Do you think that improper indulgence?"

"Do you not find," said Emma, "that this lassitude returns more
frequently, and requires more stimulus to overcome it than formerly?"

"It is true," said he, thoughtfully; "yet I often speak with more
fluency when under such excitement than I can possibly do at other
times."

"Once it was not so," said Emma, kindly.

"Very true, but this kind of life wears on my system. I cannot get
though with my public duties without help of this kind."

"Does not this show," replied Emma, that you have already somewhat
impaired those noble powers with which you are endowed. Would it not
be far nobler as well as safer to trust solely to yourself than to
depend on the wild excitement thus induced?"

"It does, indeed; fool that I have been to think myself secure. But,
thank heaven! I am yet master. I _can_ control myself if I choose."

By this time they had arrived at the door of Miss Leslie's mansion.

"Let me detain you one moment," said Saville, as they stood upon the
steps, "to ask you if you have heard others speak of this. Tell me
truly," he added, as she hesitated. "Do the public know that I am not
always master of myself?"

"I have heard it intimated you were injuring yourself in this way,"
replied Emma, in a low voice, doubtful how the intelligenc