Kitabı oku: «My Lords of Strogue. Volume 1 of 3», sayfa 10

And thus the matter was settled between them, while the elder wondered what Mrs. Gillin would think of the arrangement. She must be hoodwinked without delay to prevent mischief, or she would come clamouring up to the Abbey in her quality-clothes, and all the fat would be in the fire at once.

Hearing a light footstep on the gravel, Terence turned, and a pang shot through his heart as he beheld his cousin. It was dreadful to leave her behind, in the maw as it were of Shane. Yet what difference could his absence make to one who treated him so scurvily? And those smart garments, too-that aggravatingly bewitching bonnet-for whose behoof were they intended? Not for his, certainly. All things considered, it was best that he should go.

Meanwhile my lady calmly discussed a late breakfast in the oak parlour with Lord Clare, unconscious that the behaviour of her sons had been more indecorous than usual, while the originator of the quarrel trifled languidly with an egg, speculating about time and place, whether the duel between Curran and the chancellor was to be with sword or pistol. Why not directly after breakfast in the rosary? a capital spot, sheltered from wind and observation. Terence would of course be Curran's second; Cassidy here, who had been hanging about in a deprecatory manner, first on one leg, then on the other, would be the chancellor's; while he, my lord, would see fair play. An excellent arrangement. Then the combatants might amicably return together to Dublin in the golden coach to set about the business of the day.

Having settled the party of pleasure to his liking and reviewed its details, the King of the Cherokees was no little disgusted to see Mr. Curran enter presently and take his seat as if nothing had happened. My lady, on the other hand, was mightily relieved, for she liked the two almost equally well, leaning a little perhaps to the side of the chancellor, on account of his polish and fine manners. She was not blind to the faults of either of her friends. Clare, she knew, despised literature, in which Curran delighted. He disdained the arts of winning; was sullen sometimes, and always overbearing; and when he condescended to be jocular was usually offensive. But then he was a dazzling light. Curran was particularly interesting to the stately countess by reason of his marvellous energy and originality. He was quicksilver-surcharged with life-restless, sparkling, bewildering; and it amused her to try to control his erratic movements. Many a time she lectured, in private, Curran with reference to Clare-Clare with regard to Curran.

The latter was in the habit of deploring that the former was a patriot lost, seduced by England, because of his aristocratic proclivities. A patriot cannot be a courtier, he constantly declared. The ways of the aristocracy grow more brutal and more reckless with impunity; the coarseness of their debauchery would have disgusted the crew of Comus; their drunkenness, their blasphemy, their ferocity, have left the ignorant English squires far behind. To this the countess would reply (who knew little of the Dublin monde, living as she did a retired life) that he was biassed by the prejudice of his Irish slovenliness, in that he could not look upon a man as honest who wore clean linen and velvet small-clothes. And so the friendly conflict would go on, one scoring a point and then the other, one breaking into rage and the other apologising; and so the incongruous cronies wrangled along the road of life, battling with the breezes which blew round them, whether from east or west.

Mr. Curran sat down to his breakfast as if nothing had happened, tucking a napkin into his vest, and handing my Lord Clare, with biting amiability, the salt or the butter or the bread, while my lady marked with satisfaction that this tempest was but a squall. That the chairs of Terence and her niece should remain unoccupied was a matter of no moment, for the former was probably sulky after his snubbing; while as for Doreen, her conduct was always more or less improper. Perhaps her serene ladyship would have been ruffled if she could have looked on them in the stable-yard, for they were standing very close together, the one subdued by the prospect of leaving his home for the first time, the other saddened with thinking of the arrests.

They stood very close together, oblivious of the morning meal; and Terence caressed the moist muzzles of the hounds with lingering fingers, while his cousin observed that an interesting air of sadness suited him. A too healthy look, a too ruddy cheek, are to be deprecated as unfavourable to romance; yet is there a peculiar and specially captivating interest about a humdrum exterior with a blight on it. Terence was too fat and sleek; unheroic, prosaic to an absurd degree. At least his cousin chose to think so as she looked at him. Then she glanced down at her own fine raiment with disgust, and hated prosperity. What right had she to flaunt in delicate muslins while her people were in bondage? Sackcloth and ashes would become her better, now that the last champions of her faith were pining in duress. As for the youth here, it was only fitting that he should be fat and sleek; for was he not a Protestant, one of the oppressors? What was his trouble to her trouble-sorrow for a race ground down? True, his mother loved him not, and his brother was inconsiderate. He should have spoken boldly, putting his foot down as Doreen would have done, though his was big and hers was tiny-demanding at least some sort of respectful consideration, instead of wrapping himself in injured airs as he proposed to do. And as the thought passed through her mind it was touched by a tinge of self; for if Terence were to go away, one of the safeguards of his cousin's peace would slip from her. With the instinct of intrigue, which is planted in the staidest of female bosoms, she had determined that the best way, perhaps, of counteracting her aunt's eccentric marriage scheme would be to play one brother off against the other. As to a match with Shane, that was out of the question; to marry Terence would be equally undesirable. Even now, the wistful humility with which he surveyed her fairy bonnet was conducive only to laughter. He did not care for her any more than she cared for him-of course not. But is it not de rigueur for youths to sigh intermittently after domesticated cousins till the moment for the grande passion arrives, when they breathe like furnaces and threaten to fling themselves out of windows? His was clearly a case of primary intermittent fever, which was not a serious cause for alarm; and the damsel was quite justified in employing its vagaries for the protection of her own peace. My lady's project, she considered, would tumble to pieces in time through inherent weakness. Till that auspicious moment arrived it would be necessary to stave off a crisis. It was merely a matter of time-a brief struggle between two strong wills, in which my lady would succumb, as she invariably did when pitted against her stubborn niece. For this reason it was annoying that Terence should go away, and Doreen felt tempted to employ such arts as she might, without being unmaidenly, for the prevention of a family split. She said therefore, with a distracting glance of her brown eyes, while eager muzzles wormed into her hand:

'Is this quite irrevocable? The house will be so dull without you.'

'I would stay if you really wished it,' blurted out the inflammable youth, pinching a cold nose till the dog-its owner-broke away howling. 'You know there is nothing I would not do to please you, Doreen!'

'Is there not?' she returned, with a ring of bitterness, for she was too straightforward to feel aught but impatience for idle protestations. 'To please me, would you give up all for Erin, as Theobald has done? No-you would not. A fine-weather sailor, Terence! You give up anything, who have all your life been lapped in luxury-and why should you? Thanks to Mr. Curran, the legal ball is at your foot, and you only need to work to become rich and happy. But I shall be sorry to miss your bright face, for all that.'

A second flash, as of a burn in sunlight, carried the lad beyond his usual prudence. With disconcerting suddenness he seized her hand and brought his flushed cheek close to hers.

'Doreen!' he gasped. 'If you will love me and be my wife, I will do anything and bear anything. You've only to direct. I'm poor I know, but I will work, for I am capable of better things if I have an object.'

But Miss Wolfe, though far from a coquette, was gifted with presence of mind. Her intention had been not to provoke an untoward declaration such as would exasperate her aunt, and, possibly, Lord Glandore; but to use this impulsive swain as a bulwark of protection against the assaults of my lady. Perchance, under the circumstances, it was better that he should depart for a few months to cool his too explosive ardour. It would not do to encourage, nor yet to quarrel with him. She escaped from him therefore, holding up her pretty hands, and said demurely:

'Of course, if Mr. Curran really wishes it, you had better obey. It is a long ride for you every morning from the Abbey to the Four-courts.'

The Priory, on the other side of Dublin, was about the same distance from the Four-courts, Terence thought with anger. The girl was playing with him, as she always did.

'I hope Sara will make you comfortable,' she went on. 'No doubt she will, she is so sweet a girl. Then we shall meet at Castle balls, and you shall lead me out for a rigadoon like a mere stranger. That will be funny, will it not? You don't mean what you say one bit, and it is a relief to me to know that it is all flummery-you silly, hot-pated, blarneying Pat! Come along. We will go and eat our breakfast and be thankful that we have one to eat, instead of talking nonsense. That is all that you or I are fit for, I am afraid! For it is not such as you nor I who are destined to save poor Ireland!'

CHAPTER IX.
THE PRIORY

A year went by, and Terence was still away from home, an inmate of the Priory; settled down, much against his will, as a sober councillor, principal assistant to Mr. Curran, the continually rising advocate. Sober is scarcely the fitting epithet, for conviviality was the besetting sin of all classes of Irish in the eighteenth century, and it was notorious that legal gentlemen, from Judge Clonmel to the meanest attorney, were constantly in the habit of going drunk to roost. Where lawyers led, Dublin was fain to follow, for the Bar took the lead in the society of the metropolis, occupying a strong middle position of its own between 'gentlemen to the backbone' and 'half-mounted' ditto, from, which it dictated to both. As the policy of ministers grew more and more unpopular, it became more and more urgent that Government patronage should be expended in purchasing support for the measures under which the country groaned; and where could support be more easily found than among the exponents of forensic wisdom?

Successfully to do battle with Flood and Grattan it was necessary to scrape together as much intellect as was available, and so every promising barrister became certain of a seat in parliament if he would furbish up his brains for the Viceroy's benefit. This gave to the lawyers a prestige which drew sons of peers within their ranks, and they assumed superior airs, which no man challenged, in that their profession was a nursery to the senate-a step-ladder to the highest honours. Younger sons of noble houses invariably lean towards the middle class, because a wide difference of income divides them in feeling and ways of thought from their elder brothers. Such lordlings as possessed a competence chose to while away their hours elegantly in gowns and bands. And so the Bar became the fashion, the lawyers being credited with such attributes as they thought proper to adopt, and being permitted to wield an arbitrary sway which was beneficial and mirth-inspiring. They assumed the right of mind over matter, and people bowed the knee without inquiry, for they were pre-eminently jolly dogs who made life the merrier, whose scraps of legal lore sounded mightily sonorous to ignorant ears, and who, if one was rash enough to presume to dispute their law, were always ready to take refuge behind the inevitable pistol. But human nature at its best is frail, and even lawyers are not always pure. When came the tug of war-when the Four-courts were closed and courts-martial juggled away men's lives-the councillors prated no more of their incorruptible virtue, but donned the uniform as others did, and truckled, with a few bright exceptions, as meanly as the rest.

But we are now in 1796, when King Claret ruled the roast; when all were besotted with drink, from Clonmel who gave sentence with a drop in his eye, to the beggar in the dock who starved his stomach to buy a drain of spirits; when out of the six thousand houses which formed Dublin, thirteen hundred were occupied as boozing-kens; when guests were deprived of their shoes by a host who understood hospitality, and broken glass was sprinkled in the passages to prevent a man from jibbing at his liquor.

Mr. Curran's fears were being realised in this year of '96, for the criminal business to which he had turned his attention was increasing on his hands through the swelling torrent of treasonable charges. My Lord Clare's policy was bearing its full crop of evils, for he had succeeded in moulding the too plastic Viceroy into the shape that suited him, according to the plan laid down by Mr. Pitt. Lord Camden, whilst meaning to do well, was repeatedly led astray, as many a better man has been before him. To Clare he was a docile cat. He submitted to the secret council of Lords-that mysterious wehmgericht-who were urged by the chancellor to the most violent proceedings, and became unconsciously a scapegoat for the bearing of the sins of others.

Under skilful manipulation the Society of United Irishmen flourished prodigiously. Tom Emmett and Neilson were kept in prison, where they languished without trial. Others were let out and caged again as occasion required, that they might inflame their fellows with a catalogue of dread experiences. Midnight meetings resulted, wherein orators declaimed of the wickedness of the perfidious one, and summoned all true patriots to take the fatal oath. The decision which had been come to on the disastrous night in Trinity was carried out to the letter, and was much assisted in its fulfilmeut by the harsh treatment of the chiefs. The military system was engrafted on the civil.

Faithful to his promise, Cassidy rode to Belfast, delivered Emmett's order to the delegates there, and then with commendable prudence subsided into the background. The provincial committee spread out its arms, from which new ones were speedily engendered, and passed resolutions of grave import, while England stifled her merriment. Civil officers were to wear military titles. A secretary over twelve was to become a petty officer with gewgaws on his coat; a delegate over five of these, a captain, with more gewgaws; a superior over five captains, a colonel with a plume; mighty fine! The colonels of each county were to send three names to the central directory, from which one was to be chosen adjutant-general of his county to deal directly with the capital. And thus a national army was forming in the dark, just as the Volunteer army had sprung up in the daylight, with the important difference that by this time England had cured her wounds and regained her pristine strength.

I protest that this linen-draper-medley masquerading in galoon would be laughable, were it not so sad a spectacle. But who shall dare to laugh at honest men, whose delusions are nursed and played upon instead of being tenderly swept away? Curran's sympathies were with the reformers, but not his judgment; and he became a sort of link between two parties. His position as a lawyer gave him the entrée to the best houses, whilst his homely habits and untidy dress caused the lower orders to look on him as one of themselves. Between the rival parties he shillyshallied with a weakness which his character belied, grumbling at the patriots for their imprudence, growling at the sins of Government, very uncomfortable in his mind, and of no use so far to either of the opposing factions.

As the members of the society committed themselves more deeply, Lord Clare became more gay. He hinted to the half-mounted gentry that if they liked it they might volunteer as active agents against the misguided youths who were preparing to turn Ireland topsy-turvy. Nothing could please the squireens better than this tacit permission to give vent to their worst passions. Brutal, cruel, sycophantic (as ignorant and depraved natures are), they began to band themselves in regiments, with nobles for superior officers, and to commit outrages on those below them, pretty certain that they would be indemnified for any atrocity they might commit. L'appétit vient en mangeant. The peasant, ground down and wretched to the level of the serf of Elizabeth, howled out that Justice was indeed fled, and hearkened with ravenous avidity to the voice of the charmer who sang of French ships in the offing, and a proximate term to misery. Drilling went on under cover of night, and the practice of the pike, since gunpowder could not be purchased; and the shibboleth anent the bough which was to be planted in England's crown might be heard a hundred times in whispers on every market-day.

But, misery or no misery, folks must eat and drink, and the Hibernian nature-as quick to resent as to forgive, as vehement as indiscreet-is given to extremes, from sadness to mirth and back again.

Mr. Curran, though his heart was sore, was fond of dainty viands, and beguiled himself, as others did, with the pleasures of the table; striving to drown, with a clatter of knives and forks, the din of approaching tempest. His board was ever sumptuously garnished, his claret of the best, his welcome of the warmest, and few who were bidden to partake of it ever declined his hospitality.

Timid Arthur Wolfe, who was growing more cautious every day, and doing his best to serve two masters for his daughter's sake, implored his friend to take example by himself, demonstrating in the clearest way that the history of my Lord Clare was becoming the history of all Ireland, and that a man with a child's future in his hands has no right to run a-muck. He had found out that the chancellor had endeavoured to buy Curran, and failing ignominiously in that attempt, was trying to undermine his business. Why be for ever snarling at Lord Clare? It would be the old story of the pipkin and the iron pot. To which arguments Curran answered, laughing:

'Is it I that's the frog, and he the bull? Maybe it'll turn out t'other way. I'm mad, no doubt, to set my small pebble to stop his chariot, but many a trivial thing has proved the factor in a great catastrophe, and I'll even insert my pebble. Fudge, Arthur! I'm too popular, and my life's too open for even Lord Clare to wreak his vengeance on me.'

Then Arthur Wolfe persisted, entreating that at least he would avoid the charge of holding seditious meetings at his house. The weekly dinners at the Priory were jovial, he admitted, beyond compare. The cup went round as merrily as if Erin were a buxom wench, dimpled, and well-to-do-but there could be no denying that those who drank of it were marked men mostly, who knew the inside of Newgate as well as the Priory parlour, and these were ticklish times for political flirtation. What would befall Sara, honest Arthur pleaded, if an accident were to befall the councillor? So delicate a blossom would shrivel under the first frostnipping. On her father's head must rest the consequence if misfortune crushed his child.

At mention of Sara Mr. Curran would become exceedingly perplexed, torn by two apparently incompatible duties, as he reflected on his pale primrose. How wonderful are the decrees of Fate! Why are beings, abnormally sensitive and delicate-whose fibres are liable to injury by the most careful handling-pitchforked into a world of stones for the express purpose of being bruised? Sara's nature was one which needed sun and flowers, hourly solicitude and broidered blanketing, yet here was she cast upon a rocky coast, battered by cold winds, which threatened to become each day more easterly! Was she sent to earth merely to bear pain, to linger for a space in more or less protracted agony, and then to die? Possibly. It is a cruel creed to accept, but the experience of the world we live in forces it upon us. Perchance we shall learn to see a reason for it later on.

The crash was coming, as none perceived more clearly than Mr. Curran. Might anything avert it? Nothing. What would happen to cherished ones in the throes of the hurricane? But how bootless was such self-communing! Fais ce que devra! Mr. Curran was determined not to shrink from duty to the soil which gave him birth. Though the days of Roman virtue were overpast, he would sacrifice his heart's treasure on the altar if need were, trusting to God's mercy for the rest; and it was the kernel of his project to keep watch over the society-with it in the spirit, but not of it in the body. He was wont to say with pride that he had never wittingly snubbed any man who was in earnest. Self-willed himself, he respected those who strove to make themselves, and respected men doubly if their aspirations were unselfish. He said to himself that the motives of this small self-sacrificing band were pure where all else was foul; that though for their own sakes he dared not espouse their tenets openly, yet it would be a coward's act to deprive them of his countenance and advice because they walked in danger. So he shook his head at time-serving Arthur Wolfe, and went his independent way, and waited for his chosen guests each Wednesday afternoon, caring no fig for Lord Clare's menaces, sorry only that he continued to exist.

He stood straddle-legged at the hour of five on a reception-day, among the dishevelled laurestinus bushes, which he was pleased to call his avenue, swinging his portly watch by its ribbon-as his way was when guests were late. The Priory was a snug abode, if not endowed with beauty; but then the works of man in Ireland are seldom in beautiful accordance with the handiwork of God. It was a frightful ungainly villa erected in the hideous style of Irish suburban architecture, with attenuated slits of windows and tall consumptive doors set half-way up in a bald waste of rough whitewashed wall. The usual alpine stair led to the entrance; arranged, as it appeared, for the purpose of setting an honoured guest on a glorious pinnacle of observation, till slipshod Kathy could hitch up her draggled skirts to let him in.

From the parlour window might be admired a prospect of barn, dunghill, dovecote, horsepond, piggery, which offered to the nose in summer a bouquet of varied sweets; while the usual yard or two of road swept round the usual dark circular grassplot with a mouldy rhododendron in the centre of it. The orchard behind was christened by its owner his pistol-gallery, but it was at the same time a forum; for there might Mr. Curran frequently be seen of a morning, declaiming with Demosthenic energy, whilst he lodged bullets at intervals in the bark of special trees.

The odour of savoury viands assailed his nostrils as he stood statue-like on the pinnacle and whirled his watch, for he hated unpunctuality above all things. His beetle-brows were knit, his lower lip protruded, and he wondered whether any of his guests had been arrested. That was naturally his first fear, and he wagged his head with gloom at some ducks that quacked in a neighbouring puddle as he surveyed the lugubrious possibility.

'Idiots!' he moralised. 'Pictures of ourselves, who dream of dinner as though sorrow could not wake. Alas! Fate is common and the future is unseen, as the Arab proverb has it. You rejoice in the balmy showers, do you? – not knowing, in your crass ignorance, that they will make the peas grow! And here are we, as foolish as you, going in for a jollification, as though a few months might not bring grief to all of us! Ahem! It is well that we are a careless nation, or every Irishman would cut his throat before he grew to manhood.'

Terence, who was drawing corks as if catering for an army, laughed aloud, for he at least showed no signs of brooding melancholy; being prepared rather to take life as he found it, and enjoy it too, for his bright brave nature endeared him to all, and he was himself too frank to believe in the pervading blackness of the human heart. As Doreen pictured, he had attended the Castle balls during the winter, and had led out his cousin for a turn of passepied or rigadoon without much sighing; had dutifully called on his mother when Shane was safe away, and had spent the rest of his time yawning over briefs for the behoof of Mr. Curran.

These briefs caused little disputes sometimes between the two, which it became Sara's duty to smooth away-for Terence was wofully idle and abhorred his work, being wont to declare that intellectual labour was one thing, and unintellectual drudgery another, till his chief waxed exceeding wroth, and asserted that idleness led to mischief. Sometimes there appeared a flickering flame of ambition in him, which Curran tried hard to foster; but before he had time to fan it, Terence would cry, 'Oh, bother?' and, flinging the brief into the garden, go forth to fish with Phil. No one could be angry with him long. Idleness seems to suit some natures, which appear moulded for the enjoyment of other people's labour.

In the ways of the world Terence was an infant; in the balance of right and wrong inclined to be unsteady from sheer indolence of brain. His bubbling, brawling flow of spirits deceived casual observers, who set him down as frivolous, impelled by the lightest breeze. Doreen, whose experience was limited, thought him so with a feeling of affection, in which contempt was mingled; but Curran knew better. He knew that many a sensitive man wilfully assumes a disparaging exterior to mask his holy of holies even from himself. He knew that few among us ever quite know ourselves; but wake up sometimes in the decline of life to discover new virtues or new vices, of whose existence we were quite unconscious; that we come to know our own characters by flashes, just as we learn those of our nearest and dearest friends.

Terence was a general favourite; a hearty devil-may-care young fellow, with a good digestion and few individual troubles, and was looked upon with awe by gentle little Sara, as he helped in her household cares. Indeed, Mr. Curran was justified in being cross this day, for the repast was ready, if the guests were not. Veal, turkey, ham-all piping hot-smoked in their respective dishes. Powldoody oysters smiled as a centre-piece, flanked by speckled trout, caught but an hour ago by Terence's servant Phil. Rows of wine-bottles garnished the parlour wainscoting; the trim little hostess was squeezing lemons into a jug on the hearthstone, with a view to prospective punch. He spun his watch faster and faster as moments waned, more and more certain that something untoward must have happened, and was no little relieved by the sound of horses' feet, and the sight of his party approaching.

'Hooroo, boys!' he cried cheerily, shaking off his gloom. 'Ye're late, but no mather; ye're welcome, and shall carry home what ye like with ye, rather than an appetite.'

Sara had a becoming blush ready for her undergraduate, as he approached to kiss her hand. She looked shyly in his eyes, and marked with uneasiness that they were growing very dreamy, while an habitual contraction fretted his forehead, which she knew came from distress about his brother. She knew-for sometimes she took entrancing walks with him-that his temper was becoming soured and his spirit chafed, in that Tom languished on in prison without trial. Was not such injustice outrageous? The charges against him were grave, no doubt; that bit of paper which blundering Cassidy had failed to swallow was compromising in a high degree; but then others quite as much compromised were let off long since with a fine, whilst Tom remained untried. Any trial-before a jury however packed-would be better than such lingering suspense. If the worst came to the worst, the crown of martyrdom, which would go with conviction, would be some small comfort; but to have lain rotting in a gaol for a year, to be immured without a term till well-nigh forgotten, was like the death of a rat in a hole; and as ardent young Robert thought of it, his constitutional dread of bloodshed almost went from him. Seeing what he was forced to see, he regretted his oath in nowise.

Among many enthusiasts few were so enthusiastic as this boy-few looked so hopefully for news of Tone and of his doings in France. The newspaper of his imprisoned brother had somehow revived, though the guiding hand was shackled, and wonderful articles appeared in its pages which might well have brought down, for the second time, the chancellor's vengeful claw on it. But such rash ebullitions of an imprudent ardour were just what Lord Clare required. Nobody knew who edited Tom's journal now (possibly many had a finger in it). It certainly was not Robert, for he was but eighteen and a student still of Trinity; but that he helped and gambolled on the chasm's verge, his friends did know, and remonstrated with him more than once.

Curran was constantly lecturing him, but without effect, for the froward boy only bade him attend to his own affairs; suggested that if he wanted to save somebody from the vortex he had better look after his own future son-in-law, and this made Curran angry. Yes; this was one of the things which had resulted from Terence's leaving home. Busybodies had winked and nodded, declaring that the little lawyer was wise in his generation; that, having feathered his nest, he might do worse for Sara than introduce her into the peerage with a plump dowry. If a trifle reckless he was shrewd, they said; for whilst dallying with the United Irishmen he had taken care to drag along with him the brother of a great lord, who could not well interfere on behalf of a near kinsman without also throwing the ægis of his rank over another who ran in couples with him. The busybodies talked nonsense, as they generally do. Mr. Curran had no views as yet with regard to Sara, and required the protection of no aristocratic ægis. His reputation had risen so high during the last twelve months by reason of the splendid bravery with which he had defended the foes of established government, that neither Pitt nor Clare dared at this moment to touch the champion. His place at the Bar was so unique that there was no man, not merely next, but near him. Other advocates were to him as the stars to the sunbeam. In court he was at once persuasive, eloquent, acute, argumentative; striking with cunning hand the chord of pity, then (for he knew his audience) checking the rising tear with laughter. As a cross-examiner he was unrivalled. Let truth and falsehood be ever so intricately dovetailed, he could part them with a touch. Swiftly he would place his finger on a vital point, untwist a tangle and involve perjury in the confusion of its contradictions. So long as he retained his purity, it would never do to assail this Galahad. All were aware of that, and so he needed no help from a great lord.