and kissed and embraced him:

"Fair sweet friend, welcome be thou!"
"And thou, fair sweet love, be thou welcome!"

There the story should end, in a dream of a summer's night. But the old
minstrel did not end it so, or some one has continued his work with a
heavier hand. Aucassin rides, he cares not whither, if he has but his
love with him. And they come to a fantastic land of burlesque, such as
Pantagruel's crew touched at many a time. And Nicolette is taken by
Carthaginian pirates, and proves to be daughter to the King of Carthage,
and leaves his court and comes to Beaucaire in the disguise of a
ministrel, and "journeys end in lovers' meeting."

That is all the tale, with its gaps, its careless passages, its
adventures that do not interest the poet. He only cares for youth, love,
spring, flowers, and the song of the birds; the rest, except the passage
about the hind, is mere "business" done casually, because the audience
expects broad jests, hard blows, misadventures, recognitions. What lives
is the touch of poetry, of longing, of tender heart, of humorous
resignation. It lives, and always must live, "while the nature of man is
the same." The poet hopes his tale will gladden sad men. This service
it did for M. Bida, he says, in the dreadful year of 1870-71, when he
translated "Aucassin." This, too, it has done for me in days not
delightful. {6}

PLOTINUS (A.D. 200-262)

_To the Lady Violet Lebas_.

Dear Lady Violet,--You are discursive and desultory enough, as a reader,
to have pleased even the late Lord Iddesleigh. It was "Aucassin and
Nicolette" only a month ago, and to-day you have been reading Lord
Lytton's "Strange Story," I am sure, for you want information about
Plotinus! He was born (about A.D. 200) in Wolf-town (Lycopolis), in
Egypt, the town, you know, where the natives might not eat wolves, poor
fellows, just as the people of Thebes might not eat sheep. Probably this
prohibition caused Plotinus no regret, for he was a consistent
vegetarian.

However, we are advancing too rapidly, and we must discuss Plotinus more
in order. His name is very dear to mystic novelists, like the author of
"Zanoni." They always describe their favourite hero as "deep in Plotinus
or Iamblichus," and I venture to think that nearly represents the depth
of their own explorations. We do not know exactly when Plotinus was
born. Like many ladies he used to wrap up his age in a mystery,
observing th