echoes of her voice seemed to reply to her during
the pauses in her song. Then she ceased singing and to the far-away and
yet distinct accompaniment of some stringed instrument in the orchestra,
she began to dance. Holding her instrument in a graceful fashion against
her shoulder as one holds a violin, and with her flowing white gown
caught in the other hand, she bowed and smiled and instantly seemed
transformed. From the statuesque and dreamy singer she became a marvel
of graceful motion. To and fro she swept from end to end of the great
rug, her tiny feet and slim ankles tripping so lightly that she seemed
to move without support through the air.

Thorndyke stood as if spell-bound, for, at every turn, as if seeking his
approval, she glanced at him inquiringly. When she finished she stood
for a moment in the centre of the rug panting, her beautiful bosom,
beneath its filmy covering of lace, gently rising and falling. Then,
asking her father's consent with a mute glance, she ran forward
impulsively, and, kneeling at Thorndyke's feet, she took his hand and
pressed it to her lips. And rising, suffused with blushes, she tripped
from the dais and disappeared behind the curtain.

The king frowned as he looked after her. "It is a mark of preference,"
he said coldly. "It is one of our customs for a dancer or singer to
favor some one of her spectators in that way. My daughter evidently
mistook you for an ambassador from one of my provinces, but it does not
matter."

"She is wonderfully beautiful," replied the tactful Englishman,
pretending not to be flattered by the notice of the princess.

"Do you think our people fine looking as a rule?" asked the king, to
change the subject.

"Decidedly; I never imagined such a race existed."

Again the king was pleased. "That is one of the objects of our system.
Generation after generation we improve mentally and physically. We are
the only people who have ever attempted to thoroughly study the science
of living. Your medical men may be numbered by the million; your
remedies for your ills change daily; what you say is good for the health
to-day is to-morrow believed to be poison; to-day you try to make blood
to give strength, and half a century ago you believed in taking it from
the weakest of your patients. With all this fuss over health, you will
think nothing of allowing the son of a man who died with a loathsome
hereditary disease to marry a woman whose family has never had a tai