‘Very!’ said Lady Everingham. ‘Did you observe the picture over the altar, the Virgin with blue eyes? I never observed blue eyes before in such a picture. What is your favourite colour for eyes?’ Coningsby felt embarrassed: he said something rather pointless about admiring everything that was beautiful. ‘But every one has a favourite style; I want to know yours. Regular features, do you like regular features? Or is it expression that pleases you?’ ‘Expression; I think I like expression. Expression must be always delightful.’ ‘Do you dance?’ ‘No; I am no great dancer. I fear I have few accomplishments. I am fond of fencing.’ ‘I don’t fence,’ said Lady Everingham, with a smile. ‘But I think you are right not to dance. It is not in your way. You are ambitious, I believe?’ she added. ‘I was not aware of it; everybody is ambitious.’ ‘You see I know something of your character. Henry has spoken of you to me a great deal; long before we met,--met again, I should say, for we are old friends, remember. Do you know your career much interests me? I like ambitious men.’ There is something fascinating in the first idea that your career interests a charming woman. Coningsby felt that he was perhaps driving a Madame de Longueville. A woman who likes ambitious men must be no ordinary character; clearly a sort of heroine. At this moment they reached the Upper Park, and the novel landscape changed the current of their remarks. Far as the eye could reach there spread before them a savage sylvan scene. It wanted, perhaps, undulation of surface, but that deficiency was greatly compensated for by the multitude and prodigious size of the trees; they were the largest, indeed, that could well be met with in England; and there is no part of Europe where the timber is so huge. The broad interminable glades, the vast avenues, the quantity of deer browsing or bounding in all directions, the thickets of yellow gorse and green fern, and the breeze that even in the stillness of summer was ever playing over this table-land, all produced an animated and renovating scene. It was like suddenly visiting another country, living among other manners, and breathing another air. They stopped for a few minutes at a pavilion built for the purposes of the chase, and then returned, all gratified by this visit to what appeared to be the higher regions of the earth. As they approached the brow of the hill that hung over St. Geneviève, they heard the great bell sound. ‘What is that?’ asked the Duchess. ‘It is almsgiving day,’ replied Mr. Lyle, looking a little embarrassed, and for the first time blushing. ‘The people of the parishes with which I am connected come to St. Geneviève twice a-week at this hour.’ ‘And what is your system?’ inquired Lord Everingham, who had stopped, interested by the scene. ‘What check have you?’