gland. Walsingham attributed his retire The grand old name of gentleman, Sidney. ment from the toils of state to the weight attained its ideal personation in Sir Philip of sorrow with which his son's premature death overwhelmed him. More silently but profoundly must have mourned the multitude of aged, poor, and desolate whom Sidney's charity had befriended. The letters written by him at various times to and on behalf of such pensioners form a noble chapter in the history of his life. He died with an estate seriously encumbered, notwithstanding "his so great care to see all men satisfied." His eulogists have been so numerous, and their functions so easy of performance, that it would be difficult to lay a wreath upon his tomb which should be distinguishable from any other. His character is not unique, like a monolithic obelisk, or a tazza hollowed out of a single gem, but rather resembles one of those mosaic altars found in Italian cathedrals, wherein each precious section of lapis-lazuli, porphyry, and serpentine, while retaining its distinctive beauty of grain and radiance of color, blends with all the rest into a harmony of glowing lustre. Such faults as he displayed carry with them their own excuse, as the inevitable sign of humanity, the natural excess of impulse in a generous spirit. To the student of history he affords a striking type of the luxuriant national energy which marked the Elizabethan epoch. The marvellous development of thought and action shown in every field of human enterprise, to an extent scarcely appreciable by us who witness the minutest division of labor, is fitly exemplified in the life of one who was at once statesman, soldier, poet, and critic, and excelled in each career as though he had been trained for no other; who could unravel the mesh of European politics as though the Old World contained all that was worth living for; and then turn to discuss schemes of colonization and adventure as though the New World were the sole outlet for his genius and ambition. To the hero-worshipper his character possesses a no less distinct individuality, and of a type which Englishmen may boast with some justice to be eminently national. That indefinable yet most intelligible combination which seems the quintessence of classic refinement, feudal chivalry, and modern civilization, the concord of intellectual grace, moral purity, and emotional sensibility, which, partially expressed in the words generosity, urbanity, and courtesy, is comprehended alone in THE MARQUIS OF LOSSIE. 66 BY GEORGE MACDONALD, AUTHOR OF MAL- CHAPTER X. THE TEMPEST. the centre of light. Thither Malcolm's THE play was begun, and the stage was eyes were drawn the instant he entered. He was all but unaware of the multitude of faces about him, and his attention was vealed in soft radiance. But surely he at once fascinated by the lovely show rehad seen the vision before. One long moment its effect upon him was as real as if he had been actually deceived as to its nature: was it not the shore between Scaurnose and Portlossie, betwixt the Boar's Tail and the sea? and was not that the marquis, his father, in his dressinggown, pacing to and fro upon the sands? He abandoned himself to illusion, yielded himself to the wonderful, and looked only for what would come next. A lovely lady entered: to his excited Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them. Then first he understood that before him The drop-scene had fallen for a minute or two before he began to look around him. A moment more and he had commenced a systematic search for his sister amongst the ladies in the boxes. But when at length he found her, he dared not fix his eyes upon her lest his gaze should make her look at him and she should recognize him. Alas! her eyes might have rested on him twenty times without his face once rousing in her mind the thought of the fisher-lad of Portlossie. All that had passed between them in the days already old was virtually forgotten. By degrees he gathered courage, and soon began to feel that there was small chance indeed of her eyes alighting upon him for the briefest of moments. Then he looked more closely, and felt through rather than saw with his eyes that some sort of change had already passed upon her. It was Florimel, yet not the very Florimel he had known. Already something had begun to supplant the girl freedom that had formerly in every look and motion asserted itself. She was more beautiful, but not so lovely in his eyes: much of what had charmed him had vanished. She was more stately, but the stateliness had a little hardness mingled with it; and could it be that the first of a cloud had already gathered on her forehead? Surely she was not so happy as she had been at Lossie House. She was dressed in black, with a white flower in her hair. Beside her sat the bold-faced countess, and behind them her nephew, Lord Meikleham that was -now Lord Liftore. A fierce indignation seized the heart of Malcolm at the sight. Behind the form of the earl his mind's eye saw that of Lizzy out in the wind on the Boar's Tail, her old shawl wrapped about herself and the child of the man who sat there so composed and comfortable. His features were fine and clear-cut, his shoulders broad, and his head well set: he had much improved since Malcolm offered to fight him with one hand in the dining-room of Lossie House. Every now and then he leaned forward between his aunt and Fiorimel, and spoke to the latter. To Malcolm's eyes she seemed to listen with some haughtiness. Now and then she cast him an indifferent glance. Malcolm was pleased: Lord Liftore was anything but the Ferdinand to whom he could consent to yield his Miranda. They would make a fine couple certainly, but for any other fitness, knowing what he did, Malcolm was glad to perceive none. The more annoyed was he when once or twice he fancied he caught a look between them that indicated more than acquaintanceship some sort of intimacy at least. But he reflected that in the relation in which they stood to Lady Bellair it could hardly be otherwise. period freely committed to their best and most powerful ally, the willing imagination of the spectators. The opening of the last scene, where Ferdinand and Miranda are discovered at chess, was none the less effective for its simplicity, and Malcolm was turning from a delighted gaze on its loveliness to glance at his sister and her companions when his eyes fell on a face near him in the pit which had fixed an absorbed regard in the same direction. It was that of a young man a few years older than himself, with irregular features, but a fine mouth, large chin and great forehead. Under the peculiarly prominent eyebrows shone dark eyes of wondrous brilliancy and seeming penetration. Malcolm could not but suspect that his gaze was upon his sister, but as they were a long way from the boxes he could not be certain. Once he thought he saw her look at him, but of that also he could be in no wise certain. Malcolm knew the play so well that he rose just in time to reach the pit-door ere exit should be impeded by the outcomers, and thence with some difficulty he found his way to the foot of the stair up which those he watched had gone. He had stood but a little while when he saw in front of him, almost within reach of an outstretched hand, the man I have just described waiting also. After what seemed a long time, his sister and her two companions came slowly down the stair in the descending crowd. Her eyes seemed searching amongst the multitude that filled the lobby. Presently, an indubitable glance of still recognition passed between them, and by a slight movement the young man placed himself so that she must pass next him in the crowd. Malcolm got one place nearer in the change, and thought they grasped hands. She turned her head slightly back and seemed to put a question- with her lips only. He replied in the same manner. A light rushed into her face and vanished. But not a feature moved and not a word had been spoken. Neither of her companions had seen the young man, and he stood where he was till they had left the house. Malcolm stood also, much inclined to follow him when he went, but, his attention having been for a moment attracted in another direction, when he looked again he had disappeared. He sought him where he fancied he saw the movement of his vanisling, but was soon convinced of the use The play was tolerably well put upon the stage, and free of the absurdities at-lessness of the attempt, and walked home. tendant upon too ambitious an endeavor to represent to the sense things which Shakespeare and the dramatists of his Before he reached his lodging he had resolved on making trial of a plan which had more than once occurred to him, but had as often been rejected as too full of the risk or she'll be neither to haud no bin'. of repulse. CHAPTER XI. DEMON AND THE PIPES. His plan was to watch the house until he saw some entertainment going on: then present himself as if he had but just arrived from her ladyship's country-seat. At such a time no one would acquaint her with his appearance, and he would, as if it were but a matter of course, at once take his share in waiting on the guests. By this means he might perhaps get her a little accustomed to his presence before she could be at leisure to challenge it. When he had put Kelpie in her stall the last time for the season, and run into the house to get his plaid for Lizzy, who was waiting him near the tunnel, he bethought himself that he had better take with him also what other of his personal requirements he could carry. He looked about, therefore, and finding a large carpet-bag in one of the garret-rooms, hurried into it some of his clothes. amongst them the Highland dress he had worn as henchman to the marquis, and added the great Lossie pipes his father had given to old Duncan, but which the piper had not taken with him when he left Lossie House. The said Highland dress he now resolved to put on, as that in which latterly Florimel had been most used to see him: in it he would watch his opportunity of gaining admission to the house. The next morning Blue Peter came to him early. They went out together, spent the day in sightseeing, and, on Malcolm's part chiefly, in learning the topography of London. In Hyde Park, Malcolm told his friend that he had sent for Kelpie. "She'll be the deid o' ye i' thae streets, as fu' o' wheels as the sea o' fish: twize I've been maist gr'un' to poother o' my ro'd here," said Peter. "Ay, but ye see, oot here amo' the gentry it's no freely sae ill, an' the ro'ds are no a' stane; an' here, ye see, 's the place whaur they come, leddies an' a', to hae their rides thegither. What I'm fleyt for is 'at she'll be braekin' legs wi' her deevilich kickin'." "Haud her upo' dry strae an' watter for a whilie, till her banes begin to cry oot for something to hap them frae the cauld: that'll quaiet her a bit," said Peter. "It's a' ye ken!" returned Malcolm. "She's aye the waur-natur'd the less she has to ate. Na, na she maun be weel lined. The deevil in her maun lie warm, There's nae doobt she's waur to haud in whan she's in guid condeetion; but she's nane sae like to tak a body by the sma' o' the back an' shak the inside oot o' 'im, as she 'maist did ae day to the herd-laddie at the ferm, only he had an auld girth aboot the mids o' 'im for a belt, an' he tuik the less scaith." "Cudna we gang an' see the maister the day," said Blue Peter, changing the subject. He meant Mr. Graham, the late schoolmaster of Portlossie, whom the charge of heretical teaching had driven from the place. "We canna weel du that till we hear whaur he is. The last time Miss Horn h'ard frae him he was changin' his lodg in's; an' ye see the kin' o' a place this Lon'on is," answered Malcolm. As soon as Peter was gone to return to the boat, Malcolm dressed himself in his kilt and its belongings, and when it was fairly dusk took his pipes under his arm and set out for Portland Place. He had the better hope of speedy success to his plan that he fancied he had read on his sister's lips, in the silent communication that passed between her and her friend in the crowd, the words come and to-morrow. It might have been the merest imagination, yet it was something: how often have we not to be grateful for shadows! Up and down the street he walked a long time without seeing a sign of life about the house. But at length the hall was lighted. Then the door opened and a servant rolled out a carpet over the wide pavement, which the snow had left wet and miry· a signal for the street-children, ever on the outlook for sights, to gather. Before the first carriage arrived there was already a little crowd of humble watchers and waiters about the gutter and curbstone. But they were not destined to much amusement that evening, the visitors amounting only to a small dinner-party. Still, they had the pleasure of seeing a few grand ladies issue from their carriages, cross the stage of their epiphany, the pavement, and vanish in the paradise of the shining hall, with its ascent of gorgeous stairs no broken steps, no missing balusters there. And they had the show all for nothing. It is one of the perquisites of street-service. What one would give to see the shapes glide over the field of those camera obscura, the hearts of the streetArabs! once to gaze on the jeweled beauties through the eyes of those shock│haired girls! I fancy they do not often "What's your business?" asked the man, on whom his tone had its effect. "My business is with my Lady Lossie," said Malcolm, recovering his English, which was one step toward mastering, if not recovering, his temper. "You can't see her: she's at dinner." "Let me in, and I'll wait. I come from Lossie House." begrudge them what they possess, except | shoe-broad opening. As it was, its words perhaps when feature or hair or motion were fierce with suppressed wrath. "Open chances to remind them of some one of the door an' lat me in," was, however, all their own people, and they feel wronged he said. and indignant that she should flaunt in such splendor "when our Sally would set off the grand clothes so much better." It is neither the wealth nor the general consequence it confers that they envy, but, as I imagine, the power of making a show-of living in the eyes and knowledge of neighbors for a few radiant moments: nothing is so pleasant to ordinary human nature as to know itself by its reflection from others. When it turns from these warped and broken mirrors to seek its reflection in the divine, thought, then is it redeemed, then it beholds itself in the perfect law of liberty. Before he became himself an object of curious interest to the crowds he was watching, Malcolm had come to the same conclusion with many a philosopher and observer of humanity before him that on the whole the rags are inhabited by the easier hearts; and he would have arrived at the conclusion with more certainty but for the high training that cuts off intercourse between heart and face. When some time had elapsed, and no more carriages appeared, Malcolm, judging the dinner must now be in full vortex, rang the bell of the front door. It was opened by a huge footman, whose head was so small in proportion that his body seemed to have absorbed it. Malcolm would have stepped in at once and told what of his tale he chose at his leisure, but the servant, who had never seen the dress Malcolm wore except on streetbeggars, with the instinct his class shares with watch-dogs quickly closed the door. Ere it reached the post, however, it found Malcolm's foot between. "Go along, Scotchy: you're not wanted here," said the man, pushing the door hard. "Police is round the corner." Now, one of the weaknesses Malcolm owed his Celtic blood was an utter impatience of rudeness. In his own nature entirely courteous, he was wrathful even to absurdity at the slightest suspicion of insult. But that in part, through the influence of Mr. Graham the schoolmaster, he had learned to keep a firm hold on the reins of action, this foolish feeling would not unfrequently have hurried him into undignified conduct. On the present occasion I fear the main part of his answer, but for the shield of the door, would have been a blow to fell a bigger man than the one that now glared at him through the "Take away your foot and I'll go and see," said the man. 66 "No: you open the door," returned Malcolm. The man's answer was an attempt to kick his foot out of the doorway. If he were to let in a tramp, what would the butler say? But thereupon Malcolm set his portvent to his mouth, rapidly filled his bag, while the man stared as if it were a petard with which he was about to blow the door to shivers, and then sent from the instrument such a shriek, as it galloped off into the "Lossie Gathering," that, involuntarily, his adversary pressed both hands to his ears. With a sudden application of his knee Malcolm sent the door wide, and entered the hall with his pipes in full cry. The house resounded with their yell, but only for one moment. For down the stair, like bolt from catapult, came Demon, Florimel's huge Irish staghound, and springing upon Malcolm put an instant end to the music. The footman laughed with exultation, expecting to see him torn to pieces. But when he saw instead the fierce animal, with a foot on each of his shoulders, licking Malcolm's face with long fiery tongue, he began to doubt. "The dog knows you," he said sulkily. "So shall you before long," returned Malcolm. "Was it my fault that I made the mistake of looking for civility from you? One word from me to the dog and he has you by the throat." "I'll go and fetch Wallis,” said the man, and, closing the door, left the hall. Now, this Wallis had been a fellowservant of Malcolm's at Lossie House, but he did not know that he had gone with Lady Bellair when she took Florimel away: almost every one had left at the same time. He was now glad indeed to learn that there was one amongst the servants who knew him. Wallis presently made his appearance with a dish in his hands, on his way to the | room where she sat alone. "I did not dining-room, from which came the con- send for you. Indeed, I thought you had fused noises of the feast. been dismissed with the rest of the servants." "You'll be come up to wait on Lady Lossie?" he said. "I haven't a moment to speak to you now, for we're at dinner and there's a party." "Never mind me. Give me that dish. I'll take it in; you can go for another," said Malcolm, laying his pipes in a safe spot. "You can't go into the dining-room that figure," said Wallis, who was in the Bellair livery. "This is how I waited on my lord," returned Malcolm, "and this is how I'll wait on my lady." Wallis hesitated. But there was that about the fisher-fellow was too much for him. As he spoke Malcolm took the dish from his hands, and with it walked into the dining-room. There one reconnoitring glance was sufficient. The butler was at the sideboard opening a champagne bottle. He had cut wire and strings, and had his hand on the cork as Malcolm walked up to him. It was a critical moment, yet he stopped in the very article, and stared at the apparition. “I'm Lady Lossie's man, from Lossie House. I'll help you to wait," said Malcolm. To the eyes of the butler he looked a savage. But there he was in the room, with a dish in his hands, and speaking at least intelligibly. The cork of the champagne bottle was pushing hard against his palm, and he had no time to question. He peeped into Malcolm's dish. "Take it round, then," he said. So Malcolm settled into the business of the hour. It was some time after he knew where she was before he ventured to look at his sister he would have her already familiarized with his presence before their eyes met. That crisis did not arrive during dinner. Lord Liftore was one of the company, and so to Malcolm's pleasure, for he felt in him an ally against the earl- was Florimel's mysterious friend. CHAPTER XII. A NEW LIVERY. SCARCELY had the ladies gone to the drawing-room when Florimel's maid, who knew Malcolm, came in quest of him. Lady Lossie desired to see him. What is the meaning of this, MacPhail?" she said, when he entered the How differently she spoke! And she used to call him Malcolm! The girl Florimel was gone, and there sat- - the marchioness was it, or some phase of riper womanhood only? It mattered little to Malcolm. He was no curious student of man or woman. He loved his kind too well to study it. But one thing seemed plain: she had forgotten the half friendship and whole service that had had place betwixt them, and it made him feel as if the soul of man no less than his life was but as a vapor that appeareth for a little and then vanisheth away. But Florimel had not so entirely forgotten the past as Malcolm thought not so entirely, at least, but that his appearance, and certain difficulties in which she had begun to find herself, brought something of it again to her mind. "I thought," said Malcolm, assuming his best English, "your ladyship might not choose to part with an old servant at the will of a factor, and so took upon me to appeal to your ladyship to decide the question." "But how is that? Did you not return to your fishing when the household was broken up?" 66 No, my lady. Mr. Crathie kept me to help Stoat and do odd jobs about the place." "And now he wants to discharge you?" Then Malcolm told her the whole story, in which he gave such a description of Kelpie that her owner, as she imagined herself, expressed a strong wish to see her, for Florimel was almost passionately fond of horses. "You may soon do that, my lady," said Malcolm. "Mr. Soutar, not being of the same mind as Mr. Crathie, is going to send her up. It will be but the cost of the passage from Aberdeen, and she will fetch a better price here if your ladyship should resolve to part with her. She won't fetch the third of her value anywhere, though, on account of her bad temper and ugly tricks." "But as to yourself, MacPhail — what are you going to do?" said Florimel. "I don't like to part with you, but if I keep you I don't know what to do with you. No doubt you could serve in the house, but that is not at all suitable to your education and previous life.” "A body wad tak' ye for a granny grown," |