“I declare that I half suspect your uncle was right. Let us move for a new trial, and try both over again,” said he, laughing, as she left the room. “Just to think of such a girl in such a spot,” cried he to himself, as he walked alone, up and down the room; “beauty, grace, fascination,--all that can charm and attract; and then, such a nature, childlike in gayety, and chivalrous,--ay, chivalrous as a chevalier!” “I see, sir, you are rehearsing for Roscommon,” said Mary, who entered the room while he was yet declaiming alone; “but I must interrupt you, for the soup is waiting.” “I obey the summons,” said he tendering his arm. And they both entered the dinner-room. So long as the meal lasted, Repton's conversation was entirely devoted to such topics as he might have discussed at a formal dinner-party. He talked of the world of society, its deaths, births, and marriages; its changes of place and amusement. He narrated the latest smart things that were going the round of the clubs, and hinted at the political events that were passing. But the servants gone, and the chairs drawn closer to the blazing hearth, his tone changed at once, and in a voice of tremulous kindness he said,--“I can't bear to think of the solitude of this life of yours!--nay, hear me out. I say this, not for _you_, since in the high devotion of a noble purpose you are above all its penalties; but I cannot endure to think that _we_ should permit it.” “First of all,” said Mary, rapidly, “what you deem solitude is scarcely such; each day is so filled with its duties, that when I come back here of an evening, it often happens that my greatest enjoyment is the very sense of isolation that awaits me. Do you know,” added she, “that very often the letter-bag lies unopened by me till morning? And as to newspapers, there they lie in heaps, their covers unbroken to this hour. Such is actually the case to-day. I haven't read my letters yet.” “I read mine in my bed,” cried Repton. “I have them brought to me by candlelight in winter, and I reflect over all the answers while I am dressing. Some of the sharpest things I have ever said have occurred to me while I was shaving; not,” added he, hastily, “but one's really best things are always impromptu. Just as I said t' other day to the Viceroy,--a somewhat felicitous one. He was wishing that some historian would choose for his subject the lives of Irish Lord-Lieutenants; not, he remarked, in a mere spirit of party, or with the levity of partisanship, but in a spirit becoming the dignity of history,--such as Hume himself might have done. 'Yes, my Lord,' I replied, 'your observation is most just; it should be a continuation of Rapine.' Eh! it was a home-thrust, wasn't it?--'a continuation of Rapine.'” And the old man laughed till his eyes ran over. “Do these great folk ever thoroughly forgive such things?” asked Mary.