_Miss Gryll._ But how was it, that, having so many admirers as you must have had, you still remained single? _Miss Ilex._ Because I had fixed my heart on one who was not like any one else. If he had been one of a class, such as most persons in this world are, I might have replaced the first idea by another; but his soul was like a star, and dwelt apart. ....Indi va mansueto alia donzella, Con umile sembiante e gesto umano: Come intorno al padrone il can saltella, Che sia due giorni o tre stato lontano. Bajardo ancora avea memoria d' ella, Che in Albracca il servia già di sua mano. --Orlando Furioso, c. i. s. 75. _Miss Gryll._ A very erratic star, apparently. A comet, rather. _Miss Ilex._ No, For the qualities which he loved and admired in the object of his temporary affection existed more in his imagination than in her. She was only the framework of the picture of his fancy. He was true to his idea, though not to the exterior semblance on which he appended it, and to or from which he so readily transferred it. Unhappily for myself, he was more of a reality to me than I was to him. _Miss Gryll._ His marriage could scarcely have been a happy one. Did you ever meet him again? _Miss Ilex._ Not of late years, but for a time occasionally in general society, which he very sparingly entered. Our intercourse was friendly; but he never knew, never imagined, how well I loved him, nor even, perhaps, that I had loved him at all. I had kept my secret only too well. He retained his wandering habits, disappearing from time to time, but always returning home, I believe he had no cause to complain of his wife. Yet I cannot help thinking that I could have fixed him and kept him at home. Your case is in many respects similar to mine; but the rivalry to me was in a wandering fancy: to you it is in fixed domestic affections. Still, you were in as much danger as I was of being the victim of an idea and a punctilio: and you have taken the only course to save you from it. I regret that I gave in to the punctilio: but I would not part with the idea. I find a charm in the recollection far preferable to The waveless calm, the slumber of the dead which weighs on the minds of those who have never loved, or never earnestly. CHAPTER XXVIII ARISTOPHANES IN LONDON Non duco contentionis funern, dum constet inter nos, quod fere totus mundus exerceat histrioniam.--Petronius Arbiter. I do not draw the rope of contention,{1} while it is agreed amongst us, that almost the whole world practises acting.