The most trying time were the evenings. A man likes to be alone in the morning. He writes his letters and reads the newspapers, attempts to examine his steward’s accounts, and if he wants society can gossip with his stud-groom. But a solitary evening in the country is gloomy, however brilliant the accessories. As Mr. Phoebus was not present, Lothair violated the prime principles of a first-class Aryan education, and ventured to read a little. It is difficult to decide which is the most valuable companion to a country eremite at his nightly studies, the volume that keeps him awake or the one that sets him a-slumbering. At the end of a week Lothair had some good sport on his moors—and this reminded him of the excellent Campian, who had received and answered his letter. The colonel, however, held out but a faint prospect of returning at present to Europe, though, whenever he did, he promised to be the guest of Lothair. Lothair asked some of his neighbors to dinner, and he made two large parties to slaughter his grouse. They were grateful and he was popular, but “we have not an idea in common,” thought Lothair, as, wearied and uninterested, he bade his last guest his last good-night. Then Lothair paid a visit to the lord-lieutenant, and stayed two nights at Agramont Castle. Here he met many county notables, and “great was the company of the preachers;” but the talk was local or ecclesiastical, and, after the high-spiced condiments of the conversation to which he was accustomed, the present discourse was insipid even to nausea. He sought some relief in the society of Lady Ida Alice, but she blushed when she spoke to him, and tittered when he replied to her; and at last he found refuge in pretty Mrs. Ardenne, who concluded by asking him for his photograph. On the morrow of his return to Muriel, the servant bringing in his letters, he seized one in the handwriting of Bertram, and, discarding the rest, devoured the communication of his friend, which was eventful.