A long day in Paris, during which Sir Vernon reposed from his fatigues at the Bristol Hotel, while the young people went about sight-seeing; a dinner at Bignon’s, where Daphne protested she could perceive no difference between the much-vaunted _consommé_ of that establishment and Mrs. Spicer’s clear soup; an evening at the Français, where they saw Got in Mercadet; and then off again in the early summer morning by the eight o’clock train for Dijon and Geneva, a twelve hours’ journey. It was a peerless morning. Paris, with its busy markets and teeming life, seemed brimming over with brightness and gaiety; boulevard-building in full progress; waggons coming in from the country; artisans hurrying, grisettes tripping to their work. Daphne’s spirits rose with the thought of fresh woods and pastures new. ‘I have been longing all my life to see Switzerland,’ she said, when all the difficulties of departure were overcome, and the train was speeding gaily past suburban gardens, and groves, and bridges, ‘and now I can hardly believe I am going there. It is a journey to dream about and look forward to, not to come to pass.’ ‘Are no bright things ever to come to pass? Is all life to be dull and colourless?’ asked Gerald Goring, sitting opposite her in the railway-carriage, with Lina by his side. They were all together to-day, having established themselves as comfortably as possible in the spacious compartment, and having provided themselves largely with light literature, wherewith to beguile the tedium of the journey. ‘I don’t know about you,’ said Daphne; ‘you are an exceptional person, and have been able to realise all your dreams!’ ‘Not all,’ answered Gerald gravely: ‘I suppose no one ever does that.’ ‘You have but to form a wish, and, lo! it is gratified,’ murmured Daphne, taking no notice of his interruption. ‘Last winter it flashed across your brain that it would be nice to shoot cariboos—poor innocent harmless cariboos, who had never injured you—and, in a thought, you are off and away by seas and rivers and snow and ice to gratify the whim. What pleasure can Switzerland have for you? Every inch of it must be as vapidly familiar as that dear old English Warwickshire which you esteem so lightly.’ ‘Perhaps; but it is a pleasure to revisit a familiar place with those I love. I was a poor solitary waif when I went through Switzerland, from Geneva to Constance, from Lindau to Samaden, picking up my companions by the way, or travelling in Byronic solitude—though, by the way, I doubt if Byron ever was much alone. Judged by his poetry, he may be a gloomy and solitary spirit; but judged by his life and letters, he was a social soul.’ ‘I like to think of him as gloomy and alone,’ said Daphne, with a determined air. ‘Please don’t dispel all my illusions.’