"Am I not fully aware of that?" he retorted--"and do I not speak for myself? You do not suppose I would call you a personified lie, do you,--even if it were true! I would not be so uncivil. But I am a living lie, and knowing it I admit it, which gives me a certain claim to honesty above the ordinary run of men. This woman-wearer of laurels is a personified truth!--imagine it!--she has no occasion to pretend to be anything else than she is! No wonder she is famous!" I said nothing, as just then the subject of our conversation returned, tranquil and smiling, and did her best, with the tact and grace of a perfect hostess, to make us forget her dog's ferocious conduct, by escorting us through all the prettiest turns and twisting paths of her garden, which was quite a bower of spring beauty. She talked to us both with equal ease, brightness and cleverness, though I observed that she studied Lucio with close interest, and watched his looks and movements with more curiosity than liking. Passing under an arching grove of budding syringas, we presently came to an open court-yard paved with blue and white tiles, having in its centre a picturesque dove-cote built in the form of a Chinese pagoda. Here pausing, Mavis clapped her hands. A cloud of doves, white, grey, brown, and opalescent answered the summons, circling round and round her head, and flying down in excited groups at her feet. "Here are my reviewers!" she said laughing--"Are they not pretty creatures? The ones I know best are named after their respective journals,--there are plenty of anonymous ones of course, who flock in with the rest. Here, for instance, is the 'Saturday Review'"--and she picked up a strutting bird with coral-tinted feet, who seemed to rather like the attention shown to him--"He fights with all his companions and drives them away from the food whenever he can. He is a quarrelsome creature!"--here she stroked the bird's head--"You never know how to please him,--he takes offence at the corn sometimes and will only eat peas, or _vice versa_. He quite deserves his name,--go away, old boy!" and she flung the pigeon in the air and watched it soaring up and down--"He _is_ such a comical old grumbler! There is the 'Speaker'"--and she pointed to a fat fussy fantail--"He struts very well, and fancies he's important, you know, but he isn't. Over there is 'Public Opinion,'--that one half-asleep on the wall; next to him is the 'Spectator,'--you see he has two rings round his eyes like spectacles. That brown creature with the fluffy wings all by himself on that flower-pot is the 'Nineteenth Century,'--the little bird with the green neck is the 'Westminster Gazette,' and the fat one sitting on the platform of the cote is the 'Pall-Mall.' He knows his name very well--see!" and she called merrily--"Pall Mall! Come boy!--come here!" The bird obeyed at once, and flying down from the cote settled on her shoulder. "There are so many others,--it is difficult to distinguish