The Earl of Dashleigh was offended. “I am aware, madam,” he said stiffly, “that you take a pride in disparaging the advantages of high social standing. A lofty position has no charms for you.” “I have known the time, Dashleigh,” said his wife, laughing, but with something of bitterness in her mirth, “when a lofty position had no charms for you. When you stood upon a certain Swiss mountain, able neither to get upwards nor downwards, and glad of the assistance of my little hand—” “That has nothing on earth to do with the question!” cried the earl, colouring and looking angry. “Oh! I beg your lordship’s pardon; I was going to draw an analogy, as the learned say; I was going to make a metaphor of a fact. I looked at snowy peaks, deep abysses, awful chasms, and was transported with a sense of their grandeur, as you are with that of hereditary rank! Mont Blanc seemed to me loftier—more sublime—than the woolsack appears to you! You, on the contrary, grew a little dizzy,—you only considered the fatigue of the climbing, and the danger—” “This is idle talk!” cried the earl impatiently. “I happened to be taken with a fit of vertigo, and—and of course you have no intention of publishing?” he inquired, making a very abrupt turn in the conversation. “Of course I have,” replied Annabella. “You do not mean to—to let me infer for a moment that you, the Countess of Dashleigh, have ever dreamed of deriving any pecuniary advantage—” The words appeared almost to choke him, so he left the sentence incomplete. “You do not suppose that I intend to make a present to the publisher of the effusions of my genius,” said the lady. “No, I have the pleasure of working for a good cause. The new gallery of our church is to be propped up by this little pen!” and with some pride Annabella held upright on the table the small instrument of her literary power. “Really, madam, you astonish me!” exclaimed the peer, rising in surprise and indignation. “The Countess of Dashleigh to enter the lists with Grub Street penny-a-liners,—the Countess of Dashleigh to receive payment from a publisher, to earn a miserable pittance like any wretched mechanic—” “To do what Shakspeare, Milton, Johnson, did before her.” “They were not of the peerage,” interrupted Dashleigh. “No, they were something more!” exclaimed Annabella. “They were ‘below the good how far; but _far above the great_!’ I should be only too proud to follow in their steps!” “I tell you it is impossible,—utterly impossible,” repeated the earl. “My wife to work for hire! I could never show my face again in the House of Lords if I submitted to such a degradation!” Poor Annabella was like a child whose high-built house of cards has been suddenly dashed to the ground. Her eyes filled fast with tears, but she was too proud to let them overflow. The earl was not a hard man. He saw that he had given pain, and hastened to smoothe down his young wife’s disappointment.