It is unfortunate that the void created by any man's death is by no means proportionate to his intrinsic merits. So it happened that the loss of Royston Keene was felt more than he deserved. Far and wide over the surface of the world's sea the circles spread from the spot where his life went down. He was missed not only by his old comrades in arms: men who scarcely knew him by sight spared some regret to the favorite hero of the Light Dragoons. Mark Waring, in the loneliness of his dreary chambers, gnashed his teeth in bitterness of envy; for he guessed _who_ would be the chief mourner. Arnaud de Chateaumesnil's remark was characteristic. Hearing that his old opponent had fallen in the front of the battle, he struck his hand impatiently on his own crippled limbs, muttering--"Sang-dieu! Il avait toujours la main heureuse." Harry Molyneux can not trust his voice to speak of him yet; and other beautiful eyes besides _La Mignonne's_ were dim with tears when they read a certain death-gazette. Truly, "great men have fallen in Israel," and saints have departed in the plentitude of sanctity, without winning such wealth of regrets as was lavished on the grave of that strong sinner. Only two women alive--and these he had never wronged--rejoiced over the news unfeignedly--Bessie Danvers and his own wife. Shall we pass judgment on Royston Keene? He had erred so often and heavily that even the intercession of a penitent who never kneels before Heaven without mingling his name in her prayers must probably be unavailing. Yet will we not cast the stone. All temptations, of course, can be resisted, and ought to be overcome. But there are men born with so peculiar a temperament, and who seem to have been so completely under the dominion of circumstances, that they might well be supposed to have been raised up for a warning. How far are such to be held accountable? Let us refrain from this subject, remembering how grave and learned theologians, earnest opponents of Predestinarianism, have been reduced to the extreme of perplexity when confronted with the ensample of Pharaoh. It would neither be pleasant nor profitable to pry into the secrets of the black darkness that lies beyond Royston's death-bed; in it few would be able to distinguish the faintest glimmer of light. But we have no more authority to fix limits to the long-suffering of Omnipotence, than we have to dispute the justice of its revenge. Let us stand aside, and hope That Heaven may yet have more mercy than man On such a bold rider's soul. A strange doctrine, that; savoring perhaps of heterodoxy, and perilous to be adopted by such as can not fathom it thoroughly. But if there be no germ of truth therein, it were better for some of us that we had never been born. THE END.