uld ever
live in England if he can help it."

The Duke certainly was an old man, if a man turned of seventy be
old;--and he was a man too who did not bear his years with hearty
strength. He moved slowly, and turned his limbs, when he did turn
them, as though the joints were stiff in their sockets. But there was
nevertheless about him a dignity of demeanour, a majesty of person,
and an upright carriage which did not leave an idea of old age as
the first impress on the minds of those who encountered the Duke of
Omnium. He was tall and moved without a stoop; and though he moved
slowly, he had learned to seem so to do because it was the proper
kind of movement for one so high up in the world as himself. And
perhaps his tailor did something for him. He had not been long under
Madame Max Goesler's eyes before she perceived that his tailor had
done a good deal for him. When he alluded to his own age and to
her youth, she said some pleasant little word as to the difference
between oak-trees and currant-bushes; and by that time she was
seated comfortably on her sofa, and the Duke was on a chair before
her,--just as might have been any man who was not a Duke.

After a little time the photograph was brought forth from his Grace's
pocket. That bringing out and giving of photographs, with the demand
for counter photographs, is the most absurd practice of the day.
"I don't think I look very nice, do I?" "Oh yes,--very nice, but a
little too old; and certainly you haven't got those spots all over
your forehead. These are the remarks which on such occasions are the
most common. It may be said that to give a photograph or to take a
photograph without the utterance of some words which would be felt by
a bystander to be absurd, is almost an impossibility. At this moment
there was no bystander, and therefore the Duke and the lady had no
need for caution. Words were spoken that were very absurd. Madame
Goesler protested that the Duke's photograph was more to her than the
photographs of all the world beside; and the Duke declared that he
would carry the lady's picture next to his heart,--I am afraid he
said for ever and ever. Then he took her hand and pressed it, and was
conscious that for a man over seventy years of age he did that kind
of thing very well.

"You will come and dine with me, Duke?" she said, when he began to
talk of going.

"I never dine out."

"That is just the reason you should dine with me. You shall meet
nobody yo