she had brought to her daughter's notice, not to say thrown at her head, a large variety of young men, to none of whom had Madge responded at all satisfactorily. And it was almost intensely pleasing to her at this moment to find someone matrimonially quite impossible to her mother's mind, who was both so attractive to her personally, and who did not show the smallest desire to treat her otherwise than a man should treat a man. He was perfectly natural, in fact, perfectly simple, and quite an exception to her experience of moonlight walkers. And this paragon continued his peerless way. "Have you met Tom Merivale before?" he asked. "No? Of course he would think it almost profane to say the moon was too large. He takes any fact in nature and then proceeds to fit himself to it. Whatever untutored nature does is right, in his view. I wonder what he would make of slugs eating the faces of pansies slowly away. I shall ask him." Madge gave a little shriek of horror. "That is one of the facts of life which I can't get over," she said. "I can't reconcile myself to wanton destruction of beauty. Oh, there is so little in the world." Now, there is a particular mental sensation which corresponds to the physical sensation of stepping up a step when there is no step there. Evelyn felt this now. She had gone suddenly into vacancy, with a thump. "What do you mean?" he said. "I should have thought there was so much there that one was bewildered. Surely almost everything is beautiful." "Do you really think that?" she asked. "Why, of course. But the trouble is that one has not wits enough to see it. And all beauty is equal--woman, man, mountain-side, pansy. And probably slug," he added. "But to appreciate that would require a great deal of insight. But Sir John Lubbock says that earwigs are excellent mothers. That opened my eyes to earwigs." Again Madge walked on in silence for a space. "Are you ever bored?" she asked at length. "Bored? No. All that anyone has ever made is at one's disposal to wonder at. And if one can't do that, one can go and make something oneself. No, I hope I shall have the grace to commit suicide before I am bored." Madge stopped and turned to him. That she was being unwise she knew, but something intimate and indwelling dictated to her. "I am bored every day of my life!" she said. "And how can I avoid it? Is it very stupid of me?" Evelyn did not hesitate in his reply. "Yes, very!" he said. "Because it is such a waste of time to be bored. People don't recollect that." They had come opposite the drawing-room window, and as they passed Lady Ellington stepped out on to the terrace. "Is that you, Madge?" she asked. Even in the darkness Evelyn knew what had happened to Madge's face. The fall of it was reflected in her voice. "Yes; have you finished your bridge?" she asked. "We are waiting for Mr.--Mr. Dundas to cut in," she said. "Mr. Home thought he was in the smoking-room, and has gone there."