Her visitor sighed resignedly. "Certainly not--the sublime creatures! It is the difference between fresco and miniature, you know. Let me enlighten you a little. Besides those of us whom you have seen, there are only Mr. Southard, my husband, and Aurelia. We consider ourselves a very happy family. Of course, being human, we have occasional jars; but there is always the understanding that our real friendship is unimpaired by them. And we defend each other like Trojans from any outside attack. We try to manage so as to have but one angry at a time, the others acting as peacemakers. The only one who may trouble you is my husband. I am anxious concerning him and you." With her head a little on one side, the lady contemplated her companion with a look of pretty distress. "Forewarned is forearmed," suggested Miss Hamilton. "Why, you see," her visitor said confidentially, "Mr. Lewis is one of those provoking beings who take a mischievous delight in misrepresenting themselves, not for the better, but the worse. If they see a person leaning very much in one way, they are sure to lean very much the other way. Mr. Southard calls my husband an infidel, whatever that is. There certainly are a great many things which he does not believe. But one half of his scepticism is a mere pretence to tease the minister. I hope you won't be vexed with him. You won't when you come to know him. Sometimes I don't altogether blame him. Of course we all admire Mr. Southard in the most fatiguing manner; but it cannot be denied that he does interpret and perform his duties in the preraphaelite style, With a pitiless adherence to chapter and verse. Still, I often think that much of his apparent severity may be in those chiselled features of his. One is occasionally surprised by some sign of indulgence in him, some touch of grace or tenderness. But even while you look, the charm, without disappearing, freezes before your eyes, like spray in winter. I don't know just what to think of him; but I suspect that he has missed his vocation, that he was made for a monk or a Jesuit. It would never do to breathe such a thought to him, though. He thinks that the Pope is Antichrist." "And isn't he?" calmly asked the granddaughter of the Rev. Doctor Hamilton. Mrs. Lewis put up her hand to refasten a bunch of honey-sweet tuberoses that were slipping from the glossy coils of her hair, and by the gesture concealed a momentary amused twinkle of her eyes. {159} "Oh! I dare say!" she replied lightly. "But such a dear, benignant old antichrist as he is! Ages ago, when we were in Rome, I was in the crowd before St. Peter's when the pope gave the Easter benediction. Involuntarily I knelt with the rest; and really, Miss Hamilton, that seemed to me the only benediction I ever received. I did not understand my own emotion. It was quite unexpected. Perhaps it was something in that intoxicating atmosphere which is only half air; the other half is soul."