"No; he does not on particular occasions rise above the ordinary level of his thoughts. His everyday self suffices for what he has to do and say. But sometimes, if we two have spoken at the same meeting, and I see the speeches reported--though mine may have been most cheered--I find little in it, while he has often said perfectly things of real use to our party." CHAPTER XXVII. THE PLEASURES OF MEMORY. "Pleasures of memory! O supremely blest And justly proud beyond a poet's praise, If the pure confines of thy tranquil breast Contain indeed the subject of thy lays." (Said to be by Rogers.) A few days after this Emily was coming down the lane leading to John Mortimer's house, having taken leave of Justina at the railway station. She was reading a letter just received from Valentine, signed for the first time in full, Valentine Melcombe. The young gentleman, it appeared, was quite as full of fun as ever; had been to Visp and Rifflesdorf, and other of those places--found them dull on the whole--had taken a bath. "And you may judge of the smell of the water," he went on to his sister, "when I tell you that I fell asleep after it, and dreamt I was a bad egg. I hoped I shouldn't hatch into a bad fellow. I've been here three days and seen nobody; the population (chiefly Catholic) consists of three goats, a cock and hen, and a small lake!" Here lifting up her head as she passed by John's gate, Emily observed extraordinary signs of festivity about the place. Flags protruded from various bedroom windows, wreaths and flowers dangling at the end of long poles from others, rows of dolls dressed in their best sat in state on the lower boughs of larches, together with tinsel butterflies, frail balloons, and other gear not often seen excepting on Christmas-trees. It was Saturday afternoon, a half-holiday; the two little boys, who were weekly pupils of a clergyman in the immediate neighbourhood, always came home at that auspicious time, and there remained till Monday morning. From one of them Emily learned that some epidemic having broken out at Harrow, in the "house" where Johnnie was, the boys had been dispersed, and Johnnie, having been already in quarantine a fortnight, had now come home, and the place had been turned out of windows to welcome him. "And Cray is at Mr. Brandon's," said Bertie, "but on Monday they are both to go to Mr. Tikey's with us."