“It is something like five-and-fifty years since I last heard such sentiments as you have just uttered,” said Repton, gravely. “I was young and ardent,--full of that hopefulness in mankind which is, after all, the life-blood of Republicanism; and here I am now, an old, time-hardened lawyer, with very little faith in any one. How do you suppose that such opinions can chime in with all I have witnessed in the interval?” “Come over to Paris, sir,” was her reply. “And I would ask nothing better,” rejoined he. “Did I ever tell you of what Harry Parsons said to Macnatty when he purposed visiting France, after the peace of '15? 'Now is the time to see the French capital,' said Mac. 'I 'll put a guinea in one pocket and a shirt in the other, and start to-morrow.' 'Ay, sir,' said Parsons, 'and never change either till you come back again!'” Once back in his accustomed field, the old lawyer went along recounting story after story, every name seeming to suggest its own anecdote. Nor was Kate, now, an ungenerous listener; on the contrary, she relished his stores of wit and repartee. Thus they, too, went on their journey! The third carriage contained Madame Hortense, Lady Dorothea's French maid; Mrs. Runt, an inferior dignitary of the toilet; and Mark Peddar, Mr. Martin's “gentleman,”--a party which, we are forced to own, seemed to combine more elements of sociality than were gathered together in the vehicles that preceded them. To _their_ share there were no regrets for leaving home,--no sorrow at quitting a spot endeared to them by long association. The sentiment was one of unalloyed satisfaction. They were escaping from the gloom of a long exile, and about to issue forth into that world which they longed for as eagerly as their betters. And why should they not? Are not all its pleasures, all its associations more essentially adapted to such natures; and has solitude one single compensation for all its depression to such as these? “Our noble selves,” said Mr. Peddar, filling the ladies' glasses, and then his own; for a very appetizing luncheon was there spread out before them, and four bottles of long-necked gracefulness rose from amidst the crystal ruins of a well-filled ice-pail. “Mam'selle, it is your favorite tipple, and deliciously cool.” “Perfection,” replied mademoiselle, with a foreign accent, for she had been long in England; “and I never enjoyed it more. _Au revoir_,” added she, waving her hand towards the tall towers of Cro' Martin, just visible above the trees,--“_Au revoir!_” “Just so,--till I see you again,” said Mrs. Runt; “and I 'm sure I 'll take good care that day won't come soon. It seems like a terrible nightmare when I think of the eight long years I passed there.”