ce 'Glass Cow'? Comment expli- The meal went bustling on. blended tumult of a hundred voices The rose and fell, as interval and onset relieved each other; but at every revival the pitch of voices seemed higher, and the laughter more strenuous than before,-save where, like veritable "Towers of Silence,' the types of reticence sat wrapt in a taciturnity that seemed to become palpable to make itself felteven amid that human Babel, with its crashing symphonies from delf and metal. All round the table quaint idiosyncrasies progressively evolved themselves before laughing eyes of Cosmo Glencairn the and his loquacious friend. About a third of the dinner had been achieved. The American Eagle was soaring sublime, on reckless wings of hyperbole and myth. The Scotchman, who had failed to find a single taker for some creaking observations on the bothy system, as pursued in Ross-shire, was watching the Eagle, with the intention of a trapper in his eye. French neighbour continued to His mutter, "Il n'y a pas moyen de comprendre ces gueux d'Anglais." One female representative of British mind, thinking entomology to be a good light dinner subject-safe to draw-had plunged into the habits of the "Death's-head moth," and secured, for a time, the sympathy of several people in her vicinity, including a curate, a governess, with two female charges, a brokenEnglish German, and a highly-intelligent-looking old whose eye seemed to blaze with gentleman, unqualified appreciation, but who, as it afterwards transpired, was deaf and blind. But suddenly another 66 5 of the sisterhood, who sat opposite, unsuspected up to this time and incog., unmasked herself and came "ichthyosaurus," and following it into action, opening fire with an up with "flint-headed weapons," alised the pupils, and elicited a which staggered the curate, demorlong-drawn "So!" from the GerDeath's-head moth altogether unman. Number One, finding the equal to the position, withdrew it in favour of "greywacke," which, fidence, until to a certain extent, rallied con"Primeval Man," "the Moabite Stone," and Panathenaic Frieze," fired off by "the Number Two in rapid succession, left Number One without any following, save the appreciative old man. But Number Two did not occasion; for the expansive Briton, long continue the heroine of the expanding theologically, laid an irreverent paw upon the Pentateuch, which roused the meek but truehearted curate, and, in a pause of silence and expectation, all the table awaited the encounter between Christian and Apollyon. During achieved, a new arrival again dithis pause, when dinner was half verted public attention, and conjects. centrated it on very different ob a gaudy and corpulent courier, who, The new party was preceded by after questioning the buff-cinctured Jove with an air of impious equality, marshalled his protégés to their seats, with looks of scorn and menshould say, "Tremble, oh ye base aces cast on either side, as who groundlings! the social Juggernaut is upon you." The public, however, paid small attention to this tremendous personage, for all eyes were lady and gentleman who followed more pleasantly attracted to the him. The lady was beautiful. It is a bold assertion, an apple of discord, which we should hesitate to hurl into any assembly on the entrance of any living woman. Did its sculptor succeed in expressing a true ideal of Beauty, or did he only immortalise the Insipid, in the Venus dei Medici ? Are Rubens's often-painted wives glorious types of vigorous and beautiful womanhood? or are they only two naked Flemish fishwomen, wallowing in a superabundance of garish flesh? Specimens these, selected at random, of the diversities of opinion upon all questions as to beauty depicted by human hands; and how much greater are the diversities when the claims of this, or that, living woman are sub lite! I make, then, a bold assertion; but as the lady is invisible to the reader, I make it boldly, not fearing contradiction, unless, indeed, some may take exception to certain features which I may state to have been distinctive of the fair entrant, sea-grey eyes, to wit,-grey or blue, I know not which, but the colour of the Mediterranean when.the sun has just gone down, and left upon calm waters a look, between the blue of noontide and the steely sheen that comes on them with the gloaming,-sea-grey eyes and bronze-brown hair, a pure complexion, a nose delicately retroussé, a mouth like the bow of Cupid, and a figure slight, but genuine and complete-not that composition of door, hay-truss, and pillow, with which art, supplementing natural deficiencies, contrives nowadays to make a travesty of the "human form divine." All these were attributes of the young lady in question; and I trust that, on these simple data, no reader will be captious enough to found a theory that she was not (what I distinctly assert she was and is) beautiful. It is a goodly thing to be beautiful; it is a glorious thing to be young (dwell upon this, rejoice in it, revel in it, oh ye young, in the days of your youth!),-but to be both young and beautiful is to be twice blest; and this fortunate lady enjoyed that double beatitude. And besides all this an attribute more exquisite still-she possessed that subtle, magical charm which words cannot define nor art imitate, but which nature, culture, and association, all three, combine to produce, weaving it out of movement, manner, expression, carriage, and I know not what besides, and which can only, but most feebly, be expressed in words by the commonplace phrase, "a thorough-bred air. Many of the guests at the table d'hôte might have been indifferent to her beauty, or denied its existence altogether; but the air noble reached them all: so that every eye was turned admiringly in her direction, and the duty of eating strenuously up to a rather high contract price was pretty generally suspended for at least five-and-twenty seconds. Certain eclipses took place. The charms of half a dozen pink-and-white damsels, who looked, but now, so fresh and bright and pretty, vanished abruptly, just as one has seen a bunch of comely village-garden flowers grow coarse and gaudy when placed near some exotic, exquisite in its simple purity of form and hue. As she passed up the hall, the sun offered an inspiration which Raphael might have prized; for the last rays, streaming through the windows, smote upon the deep masses of her burnished hair, and seemed to set a glory round about her small and shapely head. "A burning beauty!" whispered Tom Wyedale. Cosmo said nothing, but the thought written in his face was "Oh dea certe !" "And," said the American, following up a commendatory remark of his own-"and, I guess, the old boss looks like blood and bone, and beans into the bargain." These irreverent remarks were applied to the gentleman who followed the beautiful apparition. He was a tall, old man, with features patrician rather than handsome, and an expression well-bred rather than courteous; in carriage upright, in movement deliberately angular; clear of complexion, with cold blue eyes, and slight but emphatic whiskers; highly collared, amply neckerchiefed; tightly buttoned-up, as to his olive frock-coat,-his ensemble, in a word, recalling the now extinct, grand air of the old school. His temper was not in a satisfactory condition. He had a grievance, which exploded every now and then in far-reaching fragments of angry sentences, and which proved to be that he was very late for dinner, but by no fault of his own; and the difficulty of bringing the blame home to the real delinquent was that which now exercised his mind. Some men— nurses of their wrath-cannot be satisfied until they get it into the concrete. They can't say, "Confound it!"-they must be able to say, "Confound him, them, or you!" The old gentleman was of this nature, and he was hunting for a personality wherewith to connect his grievance. Every one, from his courier and his daughter's maid, had, of course, shifted the blame to some subordinate, so that half the household were implicated, even the hall-porter being entangled in the affair. Several of these officials were brought up for examination in the table-d'hôte room, and a sort of running court of inquiry occupied the old gentleman in the intervals between each tepid plat. It ended by the summary conviction of the head-waiter, whose lofty bearing bad at once inflamed the spirit of the old gentleman, and pointed him out, without further evidence, as the guilty person. So the case was closed by a few powerful observations addressed to that astonished magnate. "Don't answer me!" cried the angry guest; "it is, as I say, all owing to your abominable carelessness." "Beg your pardon, my lord; every one knows that the table-d'hôte hour" "Every one, sir, is a very different person from me and my daughter. I know nothing about your table d'hôte, except that I never saw a worse dinner or more execrable attendance. I shall report this to the direction, and also about your manner, which is distinctly offensive. Go away." "Beg pardon, my lord" "Go away, sir! get out of my sight!"-whereupon the man went, crestfallen; and the American, regarding the old peer with a curious veneration that could hardly have been surpassed on his lordship's own domain, muttered "Darned if it ain't something to be a lord! A real English lord! They all knock under to that. That all-mighty waiter would have laughed at any of your counts or barons. Or even a duke. If he spelt himself D-U-C. But the real article kicks 'em all about." "After all," smiled his English neighbour, "you see something in our aristocracy." "Yes, surr. Something to be ashamed of. I see something in human natur', too. And I'm ashamed of that. Human natur', surr, is a born toady. I ain't proud of that fact. But that don't prevent me saying that while it is sich, it ain't a bad thing to be a lord. Like the old crocodile over the way. It's better to kick than to be kicked ain't it? That's sense, I guess. Holloa, waiter! who's the lord?" The waiter didn't know, and was despatched to the bureau to bring the required information in writing -which being done, the Yankee read the name, and said. "Wall, I hope Lord Germistoune's property's big. He wants elbow-room. It would take about four of our parishes, I guess, to let him turn in. Without grazing." The tedious dinner came to a close at last, and the company melted gradually away, to take their coffee al fresco while listening to the band; or to be rowed about upon the lake, in the dreamy twilight between sunset and moonrise. As Cosmo and Tom left the room, they passed close by Lord Germistoune and his daughter, just as his lordship, still unappeased, was remarking "The whole thing is distinctly monstrous. They have only now brought me these letters and papers, which have been awaiting us here since yesterday." "How very tiresome and stupid!" said the young lady; "but I daresay it won't happen again, now they know you." "I shall take uncommon good care it does not have a chance of happening again, for I will leave the house." "Dear papa, there is no other hotel." "Not on this side; but two, at least, at Bellaggio. Now I propose to be rowed over there this evening, and secure rooms for to-morrow. If I sent that idiot Stefano, he would be sure to make mistakes. Would you care to come? It is a lovely evening, and but a short row. Perhaps you are too tired, though ?" "Not at all; I should like of all things to go with you." 66 Very well: if you are ready in half an hour, that will do. The moon is nearly full now, and we need not hurry. In the meantime I will try to get a cup of coffee outside." CHAPTER II. The two friends passed an hour or so lounging by the lake, till the moon began to rise over the hills, and then Cosmo said "Behold the hour, and the boat of Pietro! Let us hail him, and get afloat. That little breeze, just beginning to arrive from the Engadine, is a godsend, after the stifling heat of the day. Let us get right out into the middle of the lake, and meet it and make the most of it, and see the moon rising. The moonlight effects here are superb; and there is something in this air that makes one appreciative. The moon makes poets of us all down here-the moon and the lake, between them." Cosmo was right. Surely his must be a rusty soul that takes no gleam of radiance and delight from The the beautiful communion of the two. Beautiful! There is no word in any language good enough, beautiful enough, to describe it. moon must be in love with Como. Fancy-free for all the world besides, the "imperial vot'ress" must have bestowed upon that favoured lake the solitary passion of her mysterious heart. Is not this why her countenance changes as she passes over these enchanted and enchanting waters? Is not this why the fashion of her beauty there grows softer, tenderer, dreamier? Is it not for this that there she moves with such slow and lingering languor, as all those who, with seeing eyes, have beheld her, will attest? Yes, she is in love with Como; and as lovers' faces change at meeting the adored, so is she transfigured when she looks over the hills that shelter the object of her devotion. Lover-like she comes, making the most of her own charms. Lover-like she glorifies the beauties of the beloved with her idealising light. And oh most lover-like she moves in that dear presence, slowly, rapt, concentrated-piercing with her glances the solemn depths of the enamoured lake, which lies gazing up at her, earnest and silent, needing no voice for a reply; for she can see into that clear, deep heart, and there behold the transcript of her pure and holy flame. Though "Adam lost Paradise eternal tale!" there have still been left to us-few, indeed, and far between-scattered over the face of mother earth, certain spots of heavenly beauty and repose: Edens, the gates of which no flaming swords nor "watch of winged Hydra" guard; where the flowers are not too obviously disfigured by the serpent's trail; where even the spirit of man, if not divine, at least possesses some of the calm, suave attributes of divinity. Surely Lake Como and its margin are of these. The day had been one of sultriest heat, and a kind of thundery silence had brooded over the water, and over all the country round about. Closed jalousies had darkened the faces of the beautiful villas, on the lake. The luxuriant creepers, clothing their terrace-walls, hung down limp and dejected, as though trying to reach the water, and find coolness or death therein. The fountains in the gardens seemed to send up languid and unwilling jets, dim to the eye, and with no joyous music for the ear. From Tremezzo to Menaggio, from Bellaggio to Varenna, you might have counted the visible population on your fingers—a few languid forms, motionless for the most part, or only moving a few unwilling paces, to subside again into The inevitable stagnation. Not a boat to be seen on the lake save one-a large contadino bark laden with market-produce, which put off early from Varenna, but soon gave up the business as hopeless, and lay all day at the opening of Lake Lecco, the motionless cradle of its slumbering crew. A terribly hot and breathless day it had been; so that when the breeze sprang up at sunset, it was like Nature's sigh of relief after a long ordeal of ennui and fatigueas who should say, "Gone at last ;" and then everything awoke and was changed after that. The moon came up and gave her light. The darkened eyes of the villas opened and sent forth their light. spray of the fountains leaped gaily up and caught the moonbeams and tossed them about, like genii playing with handfuls of diamonds. And the flowers, instead of closing their petals, like conventional flowers, must have opened them for the first time that day-so sweet became the night with their breath, so rich with all the fragrances of summer. from either shore floated tempered strains-the sounds of all manner of musical instruments; and on the lake came airy-looking boats, many gaily illuminated with coloured lamps and torches-all vocal, some with melodious laughter, some with the voice of singing. Even the big contadino barque, under way again with sail and oar, stole picturesquely and harmoniously along, and the gentle plash of the oars acted as a pleasant symphony to the well-worn but captivating Neapolitan ditty which the rowers sang to the worship and the wooing of the muchhymned "Marianina” "Marianina! Marianina! And |