"Why, of course not, Di! How can you ask such a question? Our marriage is what uncle George calls a remote contingency. We are not to be married for ages--not until Valentine has obtained a secure position in literature, and an income that seems almost impossible. That was the special condition upon which Mr. Sheldon--papa--gave his consent to our engagement. Of course it was very proper and prudent of him to think of these things; and as he has been very kind and liberal-minded in his conduct to me throughout, I should be a most ungrateful person if I refused to be guided by his advice." "And I suppose that means that your engagement is to be a long one?" "The longest of long engagements. And what can be happier than a long engagement? One gets to know and understand the man one is to marry so thoroughly. I think I know every turn of thought in Valentine's mind; every taste, every fancy; and I feel myself every day growing to think more and more like him. I read the books he reads, so as to be able to talk to him, you know; but I am not so clever as you, Di, and Valentine's favourite authors do sometimes seem rather dry to me. But I struggle on, you know; and the harder I find the struggle, the more I admire my dear love's cleverness. Think of him, Di--three different articles in three different magazines last month! The paper on Apollodorus, in the _Cheapside_, you know; and that story in the Charing Cross--'How I lost my Gingham Umbrella, and gained the Acquaintance of Mr. Gozzleton.' _So_ funny! And the exhaustive treatise on the Sources of Light, in the _Scientific Saturday_. And think of the fuss they make about Homer, a blind old person who wrote a long rigmarole of a poem about battles, and wrote it so badly that to this day no one knows whether it's one complete poem, or a lot of odds-and-ends in the way of poetry, put together by a man with an unpronounceable Greek name. When I think of what Valentine accomplishes in comparison to Homer, and the little notice the reviewers take of him, except to make him low-spirited by telling him that he is shallow and frivolous, I begin to think that literature must be going to the dogs." And here Charlotte became meditative, absorbed in the contemplation of Mr. Hawkehurst's genius. Diana had begun the conversation very artfully, intending to proceed by a gentle transition from Charlotte's love affairs to her own; but the conversation was drifting away from the subject into a discussion upon literature, and the brilliant young essayist whose first adventurous flights seemed grand as the soaring of Theban eagle to this tender and admiring watcher of his skyward progress. "Lotta," said Miss Paget, after a pause, "should you be very sorry if I were to leave you before your marriage?"