So it is: Væ victis all through! Nothing succeeds like success, and nothing is so fatal as failure. The law is inexorable, and tears cannot dissolve the links of brass and iron which Fate has forged. The survival of the fittest is only a form of væ victis!—the destruction of the weak, and woe to the conquered! But—and herein lies the balm to the sore—it depends greatly on ourselves whether we will be the conqueror or the conquered; whether we will make ourselves strong by endeavour, resolution, self-control, and the cultivation of our reason and common-sense, or let ourselves go to ruin by self-indulgence, weakness of will, unreasonable desires, and the gratification of tastes which we cannot rightfully indulge, and of impulses which, even if good, are unworkable and disastrous. If we resolutely determine that it shall be _Io triumphe!_ with us, for the most part we come to our goal; and at the worst we can always mitigate our failure. ONE WOMAN’S HISTORY. _A NOVELETTE._ BY T. W. SPEIGHT. CHAPTER I. ‘You are a rank heretic, Mac, neither more nor less,’ remarked the vicar, ‘to say that you don’t care for our lovely Lake scenery.’ ‘But listen, my dear friend,’ protested the doctor; ‘I never said anything of the kind. What I did remark was, that your English Lake scenery was not to be compared to our Scotch scenery. It’s pretty—very pretty, but when you have said that, you have said all. If you want grandeur, if you want sublimity, you must go’—— ‘To Switzerland and see Mont Blanc,’ broke in Miss Gaisford as she looked up for a moment from her writing. The doctor shook his head. ‘I have reason to believe that the Swiss scenery has been very much overrated. And then, just consider the expense! I’m told that the innkeepers there are rogues—every man-jack of them. No—no. I’ve been half over the world in my time, and all I can say is, that old Scotia’s mountains and lochs are quite good enough for me.’ The scene was the lawn of the _Palatine Hotel_, overlooking a lovely stretch of Windermere, with the purple-buttressed hills that guard the head of the lake for an imposing background. The time was about four o’clock on a sunny afternoon. Of the three people who had engaged in the conversation just recorded, one was Dr M‘Murdo, an army surgeon, the greater part of whose life had been spent abroad. He had just retired from the service on a small fortune left him by a relative, but had not yet quite made up his mind where to settle for the remainder of his days. He and the vicar had been great friends when young men, but had not met for a number of years till to-day, the doctor having arrived at the _Palatine_ a few hours ago on a visit to his friend, who in his turn was spending a portion of his holiday with other friends at the hotel.