to appearances; but if she is what she looks no harm will come to her. If she is like other girls of her class, not too pure and good for human nature's daily food, then the result might be--not at all unpleasant.... Women, pretty girls even, are very cheap in England--a drug in the market, as any young man not positively a gorilla of ugliness must know. It rather saddens me to think what I could do, without being a King Solomon. But for this young girl who is not clever, and lodges in Charlotte Street, and goes every day to her shop, I think I could make a fool of myself. And make her happy perhaps. She should have not only a shelter from the storm and the tempest, but everything her heart could desire.... And if the opportunity offers, why should I not make her happy in the way she might like? Is it bad to wish to possess a beautiful girl? I fancy I have that part of my nature by inheritance. My amiable progenitor was, in this respect, something of a rascal, as someone says of the pious Æneas. Only at last he became religious, and repented of all his sins: the devil was sick, the devil a saint would be.... After all, if we are powerless to shape our own destinies, if what is to be will be, how idle to discuss such a question, to array conscience and inclination against one another, like two sets of wooden marionettes made to advance and retire by pulling at the strings! This battle in the brain, which may be fought out till not an opponent is left alive on one side, all in the course of half an hour, is only a mock battle--a mere farce. The real battle will be a bigger affair and last much longer, and a whole galaxy of gods will be looking down assisting now this side and now that--Chance, Time, Circumstance, and others too numerous to mention. This, then, is my conclusion--I am in the hands of destiny: _che sara sara_.” When Merton, after bidding good-night to his guests at the street-door, returned to the sitting-room where he had left his wife he did not find her there; in the bedroom he discovered her with tear-stains on her face.