in London
is Lord Chiltern's own sister."

"She knew of your attachment?"

"Oh, yes."

"And she told you of Miss Effingham's engagement. Was she glad of
it?"

"She has always desired the marriage. And yet I think she would have
been satisfied had it been otherwise. But of course her heart must
be with her brother. I need not have troubled myself to go to
Blankenberg after all."

"It was for the best, perhaps. Everybody says you behaved so well."

"I could not but go, as things were then."

"What if you had--shot him?"

"There would have been an end of everything. She would never have
seen me after that. Indeed I should have shot myself next, feeling
that there was nothing else left for me to do."

"Ah;--you English are so peculiar. But I suppose it is best not to
shoot a man. And, Mr. Finn, there are other ladies in the world
prettier than Miss Violet Effingham. No;--of course you will not
admit that now. Just at this moment, and for a month or two, she
is peerless, and you will feel yourself to be of all men the most
unfortunate. But you have the ball at your feet. I know no one so
young who has got the ball at his feet so well. I call it nothing to
have the ball at your feet if you are born with it there. It is so
easy to be a lord if your father is one before you,--and so easy
to marry a pretty girl if you can make her a countess. But to make
yourself a lord, or to be as good as a lord, when nothing has been
born to you,--that I call very much. And there are women, and pretty
women too, Mr. Finn, who have spirit enough to understand this, and
to think that the man, after all, is more important than the lord."
Then she sang the old well-worn verse of the Scotch song with
wonderful spirit, and with a clearness of voice and knowledge of
music for which he had hitherto never given her credit.

"A prince can mak' a belted knight,
A marquis, duke, and a' that;
But an honest man's aboon his might,
Guid faith he mauna fa' that."

"I did not know that you sung, Madame Goesler."

"Only now and then when something specially requires it. And I am
very fond of Scotch songs. I will sing to you now if you like it."
Then she sang the whole song,--"A man's a man for a' that," she
said as she finished. "Even though he cannot get the special bit of
painted Eve's flesh for which his heart has had a craving." Then she
sang again:--

"There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far,
W