"I think there is a point at which a man's life comes to an end," he said. "I think there is a fitting and legitimate close to every man's existence, that is as palpable as the falling of a curtain when a play is done. He goes on living; that is to say, eating and drinking, and inhaling so many cubic feet of fresh air every day, for half a century afterwards, perhaps; but that is nothing. Do not the actors live after the play is done, and the curtain has fallen? Hamlet goes home and eats his supper, and scolds his wife and snubs his children; but the exaltation and the passion that created him Prince of Denmark have died out like the coke ashes of the green-room fire. Surely that after-life is the penalty, the counter-balance, of brief golden hours of hope and pleasure. I am glad the Lansdells are not a long-lived race, Raymond; for I think the play is finished, and the dark curtain has dropped for me!" "Humph!" muttered Mr. Raymond; "wasn't there something to that effect in the 'Alien?' It's very pretty, Roland,--that sort of dismal prettiness which is so much in fashion nowadays; but don't you think if you were to get up a little earlier in the morning, and spend a couple of hours amongst the stubble with your clogs and gun, so as to get an appetite for your breakfast, you might get over that sort of thing?" Isabel turned a mutely reproachful gaze upon Mr. Raymond, but Roland burst out laughing. "I dare say I talk like a fool," he said; "I feel like one sometimes." "When are you going abroad again?" "In a month's time. But why should I go abroad?" asked Mr. Lansdell, with a dash of fierceness in the sudden change of his tone; "why should I go? what is there for me to do there better than here? what good am I there more than I am here?" He asked these questions of the sky as much as of Mr. Raymond; and the philosopher of Conventford did not feel himself called upon to answer them. Mr. Lansdell relapsed into the silence that so puzzled Isabel; and nothing more was said until the voice of George Gilbert sounded from below, deeply sonorous amongst the walls and towers, calling to Isabel. "I must go," she said; "I dare say the fly is ready to take us back. Goodnight, Mr. Raymond; goodnight, Mr. Lansdell." She held out her hand, as if doubtful to whom she should first offer it; Roland had never changed his position until this moment, but he started up suddenly now, like a man awakened from a dream. "You are going?" he said; "so soon!" "So soon! it is very late, I think," Mrs. Gilbert answered; "at least, I mean we have enjoyed ourselves very much; and the time has passed so quickly." She thought it was her duty to say something of this kind to him, as the giver of the feast; and then she blushed and grew confused, thinking she had said too much. "Good night, Mr. Lansdell."