“Yes, now, no doubt. But I will tell you this, that as soon as all obstacles to the marriage were removed, and Gerrard on his way from the East, Percival left Germany and reached Lausanne, to be seized with a brain fever, which threatened his life, and from the effects of which it was long before he recovered. But answer me candidly one question, Do you think it is too late in life for him to marry yet?” Poor Lady Gertrude asked this question in so pleading a tone of voice, that I found it very difficult to answer with the candour which was insisted on as the condition of my reply. At length I said, bravely— “My dear Lady Gertrude, if a man hard upon sixty chooses to marry, it becomes all his true friends to make the best of it, and say that he has done a wise thing. But if asked beforehand whether it be not too late in life for such an experiment, a true friend must answer, ‘Yes.’” “Yet there have been very happy marriages with great disparity of years,” said Lady Gertrude, musingly, “and Percival is very young for his age.” “Excellent after-reflections, if he do marry. But is he not very happy as he is? I know not why, but you all seem to conspire against his being happy in his own way. One of you wants him to turn politician, another to turn Benedict. For my part, the older I grow, the more convinced I am of the truth of one maxim—whether for public life or for private—‘Leave well alone.’” By this time we had arrived into the heart of a forest that realised one’s dreams of Ardennes; a young man would have looked round for a Rosalind, a moralising sage for a Jacques. Many a green vista was cut through the mass of summer foliage, and in full view before us stretched a large wild lake; its sides, here and there, clothed with dipping trees or clustered brushwood. On the opposite margin, to which, in a neck of the lake, a rustic bridge gave access, there was a long and picturesque building, in the style of those quaint constructions of white plaster and black oak beams and rafters, which are still seen in Cheshire, but with ruder reliefs of logwood pilasters and balconies; a charming, old-fashioned garden stretched before it, rich in the genuine English flowers of the Elizabethan day; and scattered round, on inviting spots, were lively-coloured tents and awnings. The heron rose alarmed from the reeds as we drew near the water; but the swans, as if greeting the arrival of familiar friends, sailed slowly towards us. Tracey had already arrived at the cottage, and we saw him dismounting at the door, and talking to an old couple who came out to meet and welcome him.