all her servants and his own, and the houses next door on each side, were in a ferment of curiosity. What was going to happen? He walked upstairs into the drawing-room, with his elderly heart beating a little quicker than usual. Hearts of fifty are more apt to palpitate in such cases as this than in any other. James Beresford was not in love with his neighbour’s wife, but he had found in her that tender friendship, that healing sympathy which men and women can afford to each other, better, perhaps, than men can to men, or women to women--a friendship which is the most enduring charm of marriage, but not necessarily confined to it; which is the highest delight of fraternal intercourse, yet not always to be found in that. The loss of it without fault on either side makes one of those rents in life which are as bad as death itself, even when accompanied by full understanding, on both sides, of the reason for the separation; and very rarely can these reasons be accepted and acknowledged on both sides alike, without pangs of injury or development of other and less blameless sentiments. Vulgar opinion with one unanimous voice has stigmatised the relationship as impossible; from which it may be conceded that it is dangerous and difficult; but yet solitary examples of it are to be found all over the world; occurring here and there with delicate rarity like a fastidious flower which only some quintessence of soil can suit; and it flourishes most, as is natural, among those to whom the ordinary relationships of life have not been satisfactory. Beresford, bereft half-way on the hard road of existence of his natural companion, and Mrs. Meredith deserted by hers, were, of all people in the world, the two most likely to find some compensation in such a friendship; but I do not say it is a thing to be permitted or encouraged, because here were two for whom it was a kind of secondary happiness. They were as safe from falling into the sin which neither of them were the least inclined to, as if they had been two rocks or towers; but others might not be so safe, and social laws must, so long as the world lasts under its present conditions, be made for vulgar minds. Perhaps, too, Cara would have occupied a different place as her mother’s representative had not her father found a confidant and companion of his own age, who was so much to him; and the boys might have found their mother more exclusively their own, had not so confidential a counsellor been next door. But it is doubtful whether in the latter particular there was anything to be regretted, for boys must go out into the world, according to the same vulgar voice of general opinion, and have nothing to do with their mother’s apron-string. Still it was not a thing to be permitted, that those two should be such friends; and now at last the world’s will had been fully signified to them; and after an attempt to elude the necessity of explanation, the