"No doubt," assented Beaumont, rather bored by the constant flow of Mrs. Larcher's conversation, "but I hope you will soon quite recover from your illness and then you can mix with the world." "Never, ah never," murmured Mrs. Larcher, looking up to the ceiling. "I'm a wreck--positively a wreck--I will never, never be what I was--I suffer from so many things, do I not, Eleanor Gwendoline?" "You do, mama," replied that damsel who was seated at the piano. "But you would not object to a little music, would you, dear?" "If it's soft, no," answered the invalid wearily, "but dear Reginald, do not sing loud songs, they are so bad for my nerves." "All right," replied Reginald, and forthwith sang a sentimental ditty called "Loneliness," which had dreary words and equally dreary music. "I do wish song writers and their poets would invent something new," observed Beaumont when this lachrymose ballad came to an end, "one gets so weary of broken hearts and all that rubbish." "I quite agree with you, Mr. Beaumont," said Dr. Larcher emphatically. "I observe in the songs of the present day a tendency to effeminate bewailings which I infinitely deplore. We have, I am afraid, lost in a great measure, the manliness of Dibdin and the joyous ideas of the Jacobean lyricists." "What about the sea songs?" asked Dick, "they are jolly enough." "No doubt," replied Beaumont, "'Nancy Lee' and the 'Three Jolly Sailor Boys,' have a breezy ring about them, but this sugar and water sentimentality now so much in vogue is simply horrible--it's a great pity a reaction does not set in, then we would have a more healthy tone." "Still there is a fascination about sorrow which neither poet nor musician can resist," observed Ferdinand Priggs, who was anxious to read one of his poems to the company. "I dare say," said Beaumont quickly; "but there is a great tendency to morbidness, too much use of broken hearts and minor keys, in fact the whole tendency of the age is pessimistic--we are always regretting the past, deploring the present, and dreading the future." "I think that has been the case in all ages of the world," observed the vicar; "man has invariably talked of the prosperity of the past, and the decadence of the present." "The past is past, and the dead are dead," murmured the poet thoughtfully. "A quotation?" asked Beaumont, struck with the remark. "From a poem of my own," said Ferdinand quickly, "which I would like to read." "By all means, my boy," asserted the vicar heartily. "Read on." All the company glanced at one another and Dick groaned audibly, while Mrs. Larcher settled herself in her pillows with a sigh of resignation. But the poet rejoiced that he had succeeded in gaining a hearing, and producing from his pocket a carefully written manuscript read the following poem in a carefully modulated voice:-- A BALLADE OF DEAD DAYS. I.