tly as a path from the lane had led us into
the fields, already half-bathed in sunlight, dews glittering on the
hedgerows.

"Your song," said I, "would go well with the clash of cymbals or the
peal of the organ. I am no judge of melody, but this strikes me as that
of a religious hymn."

"I compliment you on the guess. It is a Persian fire-worshipper's hymn
to the sun. The dialect is very different from modern Persian. Cyrus the
Great might have chanted it on his march upon Babylon."

"And where did you learn it?"

"In Persia itself."

"You have travelled much, learned much,--and are so young and so fresh.
Is it an impertinent question if I ask whether your parents are yet
living, or are you wholly lord of yourself?"

"Thank you for the question,--pray make my answer known in the town.
Parents I have not,--never had."

"Never had parents!"

"Well, I ought rather to say that no parents ever owned me. I am a
natural son, a vagabond, a nobody. When I came of age I received an
anonymous letter, informing me that a sum--I need not say what, but
more than enough for all I need--was lodged at an English banker's in
my name; that my mother had died in my infancy; that my father was also
dead--but recently; that as I was a child of love, and he was unwilling
that the secret of my birth should ever be traced, he had provided for
me, not by will, but in his life, by a sum consigned to the trust of the
friend who now wrote to me; I need give myself no trouble to learn more.
Faith, I never did! I am young, healthy, rich,--yes, rich! Now you know
all, and you had better tell it, that I may win no man's courtesy and no
maiden's love upon false pretences. I have not even a right, you see, to
the name I bear. Hist! let me catch that squirrel."

With what a panther-like bound he sprang! The squirrel eluded his grasp,
and was up the oak-tree; in a moment he was up the oak-tree too. In
amazement I saw him rising from bough to bough; saw his bright eyes and
glittering teeth through the green leaves. Presently I heard the sharp
piteous cry of the squirrel, echoed by the youth's merry laugh; and
down, through that maze of green, Hargrave came, dropping on the grass
and bounding up, as Mercury might have bounded with his wings at his
heels.

"I have caught him. What pretty brown eyes!"

Suddenly the gay expression of his face changed to that of a savage; the
squirrel had wrenched itself half-loose, and bitten him. The poor brute!