We often, especially from a Saturday to a Tuesday have visits here from well-known people; authors poets, sculptors, dramatists, and the writers of leading articles.

I think I have detected something in my master which is very characteristic of him. He loves people who have done something: he often quotes a saying of the First Napoleon: “What has he done?” and I think he has a dislike, which is almost morbid, to mere criticism. He will allow that the critics have their place in the world, but he puts it as secondary, with an immense interval between them and those persons who have done the work which the others merely criticise. He was lately delighted with a paragraph in “Ecce Homo,” in which the author pointed out how our Saviour encouraged what was positive in Christian action, taking as an illustration of the contrary the safe man who wrapped up his talent in a napkin. Mr. Milverton was always very hard upon these kind of persons, “safe statesmen,” “safe bishops,” “safe authors,” who never say or do anything but what is sure to meet with general acceptation. He used to quote that saying of Benjamin Constant’s about some “safe” person: “Il vient toujours au secours du plus fort.” But all this is interruption, and mere comment on my part upon what I ought to describe.

We had met in a summer-house at the corner of the grounds at Worth-Ashton, which commands an extensive view over the neighbouring downs. There were present Mr. Milverton, Sir John Ellesmere, and a great politician, to whom I shall give the name of Sir Arthur Godolphin, a Mr. Mauleverer, and Mr. Cranmer.

The conversation turned upon sleep. Of course, the saying of Sancho Panza was quoted: “Blessed is the man who invented sleep; it wraps one round like a blanket.” Sir Arthur then took up the conversation, and related to us the following adventure:--

“You all know how fond I am of yachting: I do not know that in itself it is so very delightful, but one’s yacht is the only place in the world in which one is perfectly secure from letters and telegrams.”

_Ellesmere._ The abomination of desolation of the present time; I can only say I wish that we were back in the olden times,--that Milverton was a piratical baron (as I know he would be), devastating all these peaceful valleys, and levying black-mail upon all travellers that passed,--so that we were not plagued with these modern inventions. Now you all praise Rowland Hill, Wheatstone, Stephenson, Watt, and all those people who have made communication more rapid. I say, that they have been unbounded nuisances to the world. As to the man who invented the penny post, he ought to be put to a disgraceful death. By the way, I quite agree with that man of business who declared that he would only meet the great evil once a day. All his letters were collected for him during the day, and at ten o’clock the next morning he would face them; but as to anything that came in the meantime he entirely declined to look at it, whether it were marked “Immediate,” “Urgent,” “Pressing,” or “Most important.” When I was Attorney-General I used to hate the “Urgent,” “Pressing,” “Very pressing” letters that came from public offices. In general, they merely communicated some calamity which no human being could do anything to avoid or lessen.

_Milverton._ I once knew a telegram do some good.

_Ellesmere._ Once! and how many times has it done evil?

_Cranmer._ If you are serious, Sir John, your words strike a blow at all modern civilization.

_Ellesmere._ Well, if they do, I don’t care. Modern civilization is no particular friend of mine.

_Milverton._ We have sadly interrupted Sir Arthur; and I am sure he was going to tell us something which would be very interesting.

_Sir Arthur._ We think we know the whole of the inhabited globe, but we are greatly mistaken. First, however, I must talk to you about yachting. I began in a very small way. I used to have a yacht which was manned by myself and one old man, and our great excursions were chiefly from Southampton to the Isle of Wight. But how delightful they were! You can hardly imagine the pleasure of sailing along on a moonlight night, the most common-place objects being suffused with beauty. All that Lord Byron has said about the Coliseum, as seen by moonlight, applies to the commonest and most ill-formed buildings on the Southampton waters; and then the talk of my old sailor used to amuse me so much. He, like many of us, had gone through a rough and severe life. He had lost children. He had lost a scolding wife, who, with all her faults, he used to look up to and reverence as a superior being. “My Betsy,” he would say, “knew a mort more than I do. Ah! you should have heard her talk; I wish she were here now.” I cannot say I entirely shared that wish, being contented with the views of life which my old friend could give me in his pleasant simple way.

Well, the great Godolphin case--which you have all heard of--was settled, and I became rich. Of course, on this change of fortune, my old man and I were not contented with our little yacht--not that I ever had such pleasures as in that little yacht--and we bought one which, as he used to say, “was equal to Portsmouth biscuit;” a yacht that did not fear the Bay of Biscay.

After a hard parliamentary session, Spraggs (that was the name of my old man) and I undertook an adventurous cruise. We had always a curiosity to see those islands that had been formed out of coral, and we lost our way amongst them, and came one day upon an island which I believe has been seen by no other civilized men. Menantra is its name. The natives rushed down to see us, and welcomed us with the utmost cordiality. They spoke a language which was a little like Basque, and as I had mastered that language, I was tolerably able to understand them, and to make myself understood. One young man especially attached himself to me. His name was Connarra. One evening I was talking about the chief town of the island with my friend Connarra, when he said to me, “Great stranger, it is nothing for you to see new towns and new people, but for me, ever since I have known you, my life has been a state of wild excitement. Although I am not very rich, I must go to the sleep-shop and spend my money in sleep. By the way, it is strange that you and your men never go to the sleep-shop.”

In my travels I have found that it is never desirable to ask for explanations about anything which you can see for yourself; so, though I had not the remotest idea of what he meant by a sleep-shop, I accompanied him to the shop in question as if it were a familiar thing to me.

_Cranmer._ There was a town, I suppose, of some magnitude?

_Ellesmere._ Pray give us some of those circumstances, Sir Arthur, which we know always attend a truthful narrative like yours.

_Sir Arthur._ The town was in the form of a cross. The constellation of the Southern Cross seems to have made the deepest impression on the minds of those who dwell under it. The town chiefly consisted of well-built huts or wigwams; but there are some buildings made of bricks dried in the sun. The town was always enlarged symmetrically. At the point where the two lines met which formed the cross, there was a square. This also was enlarged by pulling down buildings when the two lines that formed the cross were lengthened.

I will not trouble you with a description of the religion of these islanders and of their form of government, except just to mention that they were governed by a chief, who ruled eight years, having a council to assist him. The only curious thing about the council was, that the united ages of the councillors (there were ten) were always to equal if possible 530. Directly they exceeded this number by ten a councillor went out of office, and a man was chosen to fill his place whose age should make the sacred number 530 right. It was not always the oldest councillor who retired.

To return to the sleep-shop. It corresponded to our chemists’ shops. You know what intelligent men our chemists often are; well, in Menantra these sleep-shops were kept by men of much ability, who depended upon the Government, and took certain oaths to administer sleep righteously.

The sleep-shop to which my friend Connarra took me was the large one in the great square; in fact, the shop which had the chief’s custom. After that evening I never passed a day without visiting this shop, and also a very low one of the same kind at the extreme end of the long line of the cross--a shop which was much frequented by the lowest classes.

You may imagine what a mine of investigation was opened to me.

_Cranmer._ What was the sleep-medicine like? I mean, what did it look like?

_Sir Arthur._ I object entirely to the word “medicine.” It was not an opiate; it was concentrated sleep.

Well, what it looked like, or rather, what it was, was a soft, semi-elastic, pulpy substance, of the most beautiful blue colour; and the value and intensity of it was exactly measured by the intensity of the blueness. To the touch it was more like a sea-anemone than any other thing or creature I ever touched.

There were various kinds of this sleep substance. The lowest could only produce a troubled, dreamful sleep; and, from this degree, it went up to that choice cerulean blue which produced the most profound and absolute repose.

_Cranmer._ Did you bring any of it away?

_Ellesmere_ (aside). What a literal fellow! just like a Secretary of the Treasury. I do think the man wants to put a tax upon it.

_Sir Arthur._ It melted away if kept long; lost its colour and its power, and became a white, gelatinous, unpleasant-looking substance. In that state, too, it was originally found in the centre of pieces of stone they called _pompar_. It turned blue on exposure to the air. There were mines of _pompar_ worked by the Government, which possessed the monopoly.

But you all want to hear what I discovered from my long talks with these chemists. I will tell you, point by point; and you may depend upon it, each fact I have to tell you is to be explained by some corresponding fact of importance in human nature.

First, I very soon learnt that women bought much cheaper kinds of this sleep, and less even of those kinds, than men. How do you explain that?

_Ellesmere._ The explanation is as simple as possible. They want all their money for dress. By the way, have they money in your charming island?

_Sir Arthur._ Yes, called _Saka_, a transparently yellow shell.

_Milverton._ No; the reason is far deeper than that. A much larger part of the anxiety, vexation, and remorse of the world is felt by men than by women; and therefore the men want more sleep, and of the best quality.

_Sir Arthur._ That is how I read it.

_Johnson_ (timidly). But love! Do not women suffer as much from disappointed love as men do, or even more?

_Milverton._ Perhaps so, my boy; but, when you come to our time of life, you will find that there are a great many worse things than disappointed love, requiring much heavier doses of high-priced sleep,--shame, poverty, impending bankruptcy, and remorse. The middle-aged man, gradually going down in the world--with lots of people depending upon him--who has undertaken some unfortunate enterprise, which, poor fellow, he meant to turn out so well, is a more pitiable object than the desponding or rejected lover. About this love there is always a sustaining power of romance.

_Ellesmere._ Amelia marries Jones. What consoles poor Smith, thinking over it at night? He says to himself, at first with some bitterness, “Ah, she will soon find out the difference,” and in a tenderer frame of thought he exclaims, “Poor thing! how happy she would have been with me; how happy I with her if it had not been for that confounded fellow’s property in houses at Mile End. D---- Mile End!” And Smith goes to sleep, not so very miserable. His last thought is, “I should have been a better match, after all, than Jones.”

Compare this romantic sorrow with that of Robinson, who dreads rent and taxes, who humbles himself before the butcher, who fears to tell his anxious wife of this loss, and that bad debt; and has to smile and smile, and be a pauper perhaps with a brougham, which he is afraid to put down.

_Cranmer._ In what latitude and longitude is this island?

_Sir Arthur._ I will consult my master of the yacht, and let you know some day, Mr. Cranmer.

_Ellesmere_ (aside, contemptuously). Some day! some day!

_Sir Arthur._ Oh, she was such a yacht, the _Esmeralda_! She would almost talk to you!

_Ellesmere._ But sleep, sleep, sleep! Go on, there’s a good fellow, with the pith of your story. I feel inclined to use naughty words, such as Smith used to Mile End, in respect to those indispensable but tiresome creatures, latitude and longitude, if they are to interrupt us.

_Milverton._ Ellesmere, who is the greatest of interrupters, is the most intolerant of any interruption but his own.

_Ellesmere._ Don’t get in a rage, Milverton. We shall have to buy the bluest of blue sleep-stuff for you, I see.

_Milverton._ I must give another explanation of the fact that Sir Arthur has told us. Women enjoy the present so much more than men do, that they are not fond of having it cut short, even by supreme sleep.

_Sir Arthur._ Now the next fact I arrived at was this, and it appears to me a remarkable one, viz. that the highest-priced sleep was not bought up so much as you would suppose. It was the fashion, however, to buy it; to use one of the slang words of our day, it was the “swell” thing to buy nothing but the choicest sleep; though, in reality, pretty nearly all the young girls, a great many of the young men, most of the widows, and the well-to-do people, generally consumed, on the sly, the lower-priced sleeps. On the contrary, young children almost always wished for an expensive sleep. Now, how do you account for that?

_Milverton._ Obviously! the young men and the young women, the widows, and well-to-do people, liked to have their dreams. Dreams are frequently a choice part of their lives; whereas children, on the other hand, are often terrified by dreams. Perhaps it is that children have left the land of shadows later than we have; and so they fear the dark, the unknown, the invisible, more than we do. In fact, these terrors by night are some of the greatest sufferings of childhood, and we ought to be very tender to children about their fears, which often seem very unreasonable to us.

_Sir Arthur._ Good! I say good, because your theory agrees with mine.

Now, I will tell you another extraordinary thing. The doctors did not always use the highest-priced sleeps in their compounds.

_Milverton._ I don’t understand that.

_Ellesmere._ I do.

_Milverton._ I know what you mean, Ellesmere. You cannot help having your sneer; but you know as well as I do that doctors are about the best men we have in the world; and that they delight in healing, and not in protracting illness.

_Ellesmere._ H’m.

_Sir Arthur._ The explanation is clear, at least to my mind. But in order to work it out, I must talk a little about myself. I once had a brain-fever, brought on by insane application to work. By the way, was it Baxter or Bunyan, or some other considerable theologian, who spoke of “the lust of finishing?” It is a very just phrase; one has sometimes a mad desire to finish what one has once begun. Well, the doctors told me to be quiet, and especially to avoid all thinking. To give impossible prescriptions is the foible of doctors. I tried not to think; but, after a thoughtless day, my unwholesomely active mind would not be quiet. It even revived all sorts of mathematical work done at Cambridge, which I had long forgotten. I had not the least idea that I possessed, down in the depths of my mind, such vivid reminiscences of mathematical lectures. After an ill-spent night of this kind, I came to the conclusion that some new course must be adopted. The doctors had ordered me to travel, and a dear friend, who is one of our best linguists, had agreed to travel with me. I said to him, “Let us learn a new language,” and he readily assented. We will call him Bopp, because he often reminded me of that great grammarian. We set out on our travels, and this new language occupied a good deal of our spare thought without exciting us. Bopp, perhaps to look after me, generally slept in the next room. I would call out to him, in the middle of the night, “Are you asleep?” “No,” he would reply. “Well, after all, don’t you think there is something in this language like the Greek aorist?” Bopp would say, “Not at all,” and give reasons for it; and then he would turn upon me and say, “I should like to hear you go through that irregular verb which we learnt to-day, and which I maintain is not irregular at all, but the real old form of the conjugation.” Then I had to go through, as best I could, the irregular verb; and it is astonishing how soon it led to a comfortable sleep. So I think the medicine men in Menantra knew that they must give nature some play in the way of mental excitement, and therefore did not always administer to the sick the soundest sleep except upon urgent occasions.

_Ellesmere._ I declare that is a very sensible view, and I begin to believe that there is such an island, which we will call Arthuria Godolphinia, and that it lies in latitude 397°, longitude 486°. The minutes and seconds, which I forget, will be sent to Mr. Cranmer, at the Treasury in Downing Street, when the master of the _Esmeralda_ consults his logbook.

Oh, Lady Ellesmere! Lady Ellesmere! (Lady Ellesmere was seen coming down the gravel-walk towards the summer-house.) You have lost such a treat (as women say, when one has missed, by pure accident, hearing their favourite preacher’s last hour-and-a-half sermon). Oh, such beautiful things said about women by me, and contradicted by Mr. Cranmer: how they want no sleep because they have no remorse, no shame, no vexation, for, as Milverton and Mr. Cranmer both maintain, they have no consciences. (How I have been fighting your battles, my dear Mildred!) And I say they have consciences, because the existence of the negative proves the existence of the positive, and if they had no consciences how could they be so unconscionable in the article of dress? Here is this young woman coming to take the whole of the summer-house from us, with those atrocious skirts of hers.

(Lady Ellesmere sat down by her husband, pulled his ear, took his hand in hers, and whispered something to him.)

_Ellesmere._ Speak out, my dear, say your say to this choice company. This young lady has the graciousness and the modesty to observe, that there is only one woman in the world who would ever have believed anything that Sir John Ellesmere addressed to her, and that she is that unfortunate young person.

(Here I must remark that it is impossible not to love this man, Sir John Ellesmere. I always feel I do not do him justice. His sayings seem so hard, sometimes so satirical, so perverse; but the manner of saying them disarms all offence. He has a look of kindness and affection, when he is teasing Milverton, that wins my heart. And that wife of his is so fond of him: it almost makes one cross to see it.)

_Ellesmere._ But, my dear Sir Arthur, more about sleep. Attend, Mildred! Sir Arthur is telling us about an island at which he arrived in a yacht, that almost spoke to him, where they sold sleep, a clammy blue stuff, like a sea-anemone (lat. 470°, long. 590°, minutes and seconds omitted, to the great regret of Mr. Cranmer), and where women spend all their money in dress, and therefore cannot afford to buy good sleep. Doctors--the rascals--prescribe second-rate sleep: young men, widowers, and widows (young widows, Lady Ellesmere) will insist upon dreaming, and therefore buy low-priced sleeps. Heavy fathers of families buy the real stuff to console themselves against the evils which attend married life. I am sure I want some. Nothing but the best sleep for me, as long as I am plagued as much as I am. Bills again: a cheque wanted! Lady Ellesmere is so loving and affectionate on such occasions; and when she says, “My dearest love, I want to bother you about a little matter of business,” I know it means a cheque of three figures at least. Oh! I have forgotten; in this happy island children prefer high-priced sleep, because, as Milverton says, they come more recently from the land of shadows. I call that now a clear and sensible explanation, not at all built upon hypothesis.

And now, my dear, I have told you all about it, which these people have taken an hour and three-quarters to elaborate--Milverton perpetually interrupting, after his tiresome fashion. Now drive on, Sir Arthur; never mind their interruptions. I will back you up with judicious silence.

_Milverton._ This Ishmaelite; his tongue, if not his hand, is against everybody.

_Sir Arthur._ I come to the saddest part of my story. As I told you, I spent a great deal of my time at the sleep-shop in the grand square. After the sun went down, and the Southern Cross was wont to shine out in all its ineffable beauty (I don’t know how my crew felt, but that constellation exercised a kind of awful mysterious influence over me: I was never tired of gazing up at it), there used to come to the shop, in a stealthy manner, a wretched-looking man. His clothes (their clothes are chiefly made of the red and green mithral--a kind of rush) showed what we call genteel poverty, but he always bought a small quantity of the highest-priced sleep--the bluest of the blue. I talked to Alcathra, my chemist friend, about this poor man.

“Ah,” he said, “a man of his means cannot afford to buy such sleep. There is crime, or there is horrible disaster there. I do the best I can for him to cheapen it, and I lose by every sale I make to him.” (What good people there really are everywhere!) “I know the day will arrive when that man will come no more, and I shall hear that the officers of justice have my poor customer in their clutches. But let us give the poor wretch what easement we can. You know we are sworn to secrecy, we sellers of sleep, and so I am happy to say I am not bound to denounce him. To you, as a stranger, I may speak openly.”

I was quite sure that Alcathra was right, from two circumstances which I observed myself. This poor man always walked down the middle of the street, so as to be sure he was not followed by anybody; and just before he entered the shop I have observed him clear up his countenance, and try to look lively; fearing, no doubt, lest his habitual dejection should betray him.

Our surmises proved to be well founded. Two days before I left the port, this poor wretch was arrested on a charge of murder. It was not so very wicked a crime after all. He was a harsh, hard man, the criminal; but, in his rough way, he adored his wife. The wife was false, and he had slain her lover, committing the deed very artfully. It was done at the sleep-mines, where the murderer was a superintendent of considerable authority.

And now I hope you will not blame me when I tell you I saved this poor man from execution. We broke open the prison at night, an easy task to do, as the prison was a wooden building, and I carried him off in the yacht. He died, though, a broken-hearted man, before we advanced far on our voyage homeward, for he believed, whether rightly or wrongly, that his wife had secretly denounced him to the Council, and this thought was his death-stroke. His last look upwards was at the Southern Cross, which they regard with fervent religious worship. I had become attached to the poor man: and he was, in his way, a great thinker. Strange to say, all the most difficult questions of fate, free-will, and predestination--those questions which will torment even the most civilized people to the latest generation--were present in the bewildered mind of that semi-savage. I don’t know that it would have been possible for me to have kept the poor man alive, for the sleep-stuff I had brought with me was beginning to fade in colour; and I remember his mentioning to me during his later days, that his dreams were horrible.

I have not told you of some compound sleep-stuff which was also used in the island. I say compound, because I am sure it was mixed with some drug, though my chemist friend would never acknowledge that. It was, however, of a pink colour, and was used by those persons who had to attend public meetings, even by some of those who formed the great Council of Ten. Its effect was this: it put a man into a pleasing kind of stupor, in which state he did not care much how time passed, or what was said to him, and he could be in this state without betraying himself, for he could hear all that was said, and look sufficiently intelligent, and at the same time enjoy a semi-comatose condition, which made the length of speech a matter of indifference to him. There were rumours that the great chief himself was somewhat addicted to pink sleep, but, if so, he must have been very prudent in the use of it, for he always seemed to give an intelligent attention when listening at the great council, or receiving any of his subjects.

_Ellesmere._ I never have liked yachting. It is true you get rid of letters and telegrams, but then you are shut up with a few people, and what becomes of you if you quarrel with them? Besides, there is a want of space in all ships, even of the largest size, which does not suit me. I would, however, endure a long cruise in any yacht that would bring me to an island where I could buy pink sleep. You know, when I was Attorney-General, I was offered the appointment of judge, but I dreaded so much having to go through the necessary amount of listening that I refused it. Listening patiently is certainly not my forte.

_Sir Arthur._ I should not have liked to have stayed any longer in the island, though it was a most instructive place; but I knew that, whenever I should see a poor man buying continually high-priced sleep, I should be sure to suspect him of some deadly crime. Indeed, I had already begun to suspect several individuals who frequented the upper and the lower shops, and who always went beyond their apparent means in buying high-priced sleep.

And now, lady and gentlemen, my tale is told. I am afraid it is rather a sad one.

There was a silence for some time. Even Ellesmere seemed subdued; and over his mobile countenance there passed a cloud of thought, which was full of pity, but he was the first to break the silence.

_Ellesmere._ How true are Goethe’s words, that a man cannot jump away from his own shadow! Sir Arthur introduces us to this strange, sleep-buying people. There his imagination ends. He makes them have just the same motives as people in our lands, who, unhappily, cannot buy sleep, be they ever so rich in Consols. For instance, the poor wretch whom Sir Arthur carried away did but partake the fate of men in well-known climes, and the source of his misfortunes was that which, for the most part, is the source of ours.

I, too, feel the impulse of genius upon me, and must tell my little story; but it will be one that you will all easily recognise.

“Who is she?” Thus spoke the Caliph, supremely wise in the knowledge of men and women.

“Who is she? I say.” And the affrighted lords said, “Light of the World, Consoler of the Faithful, Gem of Gems, Centre of the flowing Universe, there is no ‘she,’ but the poor man, who was working at one of the loftiest windows of your palace, fell down into the marble Court of Leopards, and is dead.”

“Who is she?” said the Caliph, wrathfully; “let me know her name.”

And the lords went out from the presence of the Caliph, feeling their heads loose upon their shoulders.

And there was dread silence in the divan, while the Caliph played with the jewelled hilt of his scimitar. And one little child, the son of Zobeide, dared to take off the slipper of the Caliph, and run away with it to the further end of the divan. Had it not been the son of Zobeide, the bastinado would have been liberally applied.

The lords returned, and the vizier said, “Efflux of Joy, Wisest of the Wise, Incomparable Master of the greatest of sciences, the human heart; she is Almeida, the Princess Zobeide’s favourite tire-woman, and the man said words to her, and she listened and yet would not listen; and he missed his footing, as most men do who dote upon a woman; and he is dead.”

And the Caliph smiled a grim smile. He rose, and the lords, who felt their necks strengthened, fell on their faces before him; and the Caliph went to his harem to tell his wives how wise he was, and that nobody could deceive him. For even a caliph likes to be thought wise by his women; whom he finds not so easy to rule, though he is Commander of the Faithful.

And the lustrous Zobeide shivered and trembled while the Caliph told her of his all-pervading wisdom, for she knew that the Christian slave, Azor (who had fallen into the marble Court of Leopards), adored her, and not Almeida; and that he had died for the love of her bright eyes.

But she did not fail to extol the wisdom of the Caliph; and the Caliph was convinced that he was the wisest of men, and that the praises of his lords were not flattery such as had been addressed, to his great disgust, to the late caliph, his father, but that they were the words of wisdom and sobriety, and were as true as the cries of the water-carriers when they cry, “Water, water, from the Fountain of Desire, in front of the palace;” for, indeed it was water that they had to sell.

And Zobeide mourned for the graceful Azor many days: and when, by night, she stood on his tomb, she said, “My heart is with thee for ever, O my beloved!”

And Zobeide’s son did not fear to run away with the slippers of the great Caliph--Light of the World, Consoler of the Faithful, Gem of Gems, Centre of the flowing Universe, Discoverer of thoughts, and Azure Sea of Wisdom.

_Milverton._ Now has not Ellesmere contrived to darken that story by sarcasm? He told it very well up to a certain point, I must admit.

My dear Lady Ellesmere, do correct that husband of yours, for to the rest of us he is incorrigible.

_Lady Ellesmere._ My dear Mr. Milverton, I took him only upon your recommendation, as you well know, and not from any merit of his own. Is there not something I often hear you gentlemen talk of applied to horses, the word warranty or warrantry? You know I have something of the kind from you: it is your business to make him behave properly. This is an animal I should have had nothing to do with [here she pulled his ear] if you had not declared that he was safe and good.

_Sir Arthur._ In double harness? Did Mr. Milverton’s warranty extend to that? If it did, he was a very rash man.

(Hereupon Sir Arthur walked away in his lounging manner towards the house.)

_Ellesmere._ Now, Milverton, I have a very serious word to say to you. As to being beaten by this fellow’s invention, it must not be. You are the greatest ---- amongst us: or to speak euphemistically, you have the most vigorous imagination. If you cannot tell a story which will beat his--that will require a pull at a more lengthened arc (I flatter myself that is a good expression)--I shall despise you for ever. Recollect the fellow is a Tory. He will go back to his party and laugh at our beards if we cannot beat him in invention. I cannot do it myself. I read a novel; I come to the end of the first volume. For the life of me I cannot see how Edwin is ever to marry Angelina. The difficulties are so tremendous. Edwin is already married: Angelina is about to marry the wrong man: the fathers have quarrelled. Edwin is a pauper, and is suspected of two murders. Angelina has sworn never to speak to or even look at Edwin; and really, without joking, I cannot imagine how Edwin and Angelina are to be happy at the end of the third volume.

But to fellows like you, who are born story-tellers--otherwise, highly imaginative men--it is all as easy as possible. It goes, as the Americans say, “slick off.” Edwin’s wife, a poor creature (I am glad to get rid of her), dies. Edwin has only committed one murder--a very innocent one, quite consistent with propriety--while Angelina’s intended has committed the other, a foul crime. Angelina’s papa finds that Edwin’s papa was the man who, when he (Angelina’s papa) was going to London to seek his fortune, advanced him 2_l._ 12_s._ 6_d._ upon no other security but his saying, “Oh heavens! my generous benefactor. How shall I ever repay you?”

Angelina’s intended (a nasty man, that) is the individual who has kept Edwin, by a forged will, out of the possession of Lorimer Court, an old house, with 7,000_l._ a year in land attached to it--no mortgages, no annuities for younger children--which, on discovery of the fraud, comes at once to Edwin without any trouble. At least there is no trouble to speak of. An old woman is to die, the old woman revealing everything that requires to be revealed at the most opportune moment. Angelina “clasps” (is not that the proper word?) Edwin to her bosom, saying, however, that 7,000_l._ a year is a very different thing from 700_l._ Ditto, says father; and all goes on as right as a trivet--but what a trivet is, I should be puzzled to say.

_Milverton._ And this is the man who says he is not imaginative!

_Ellesmere._ Ah, but you do not know what an effort this was on my part, and how exhausted I feel after it. In all earnestness, and speaking seriously, if you believe I ever do speak seriously, I am quite bewildered in endeavouring to see my way through the difficulties that accumulate in the first and second volumes of a novel.

I look upon you imaginative fellows with a kind of awe. I cannot think how you invent the things you do invent. I regard you with the same kind of dread that our friend Kingsley says savage men feel for savage women--a dread, by the way, I must own I largely feel for civilized women--if, indeed, there is such an entity as a civilized woman; and I am lost in astonishment in observing how to you people fiction is, for all practical purposes, the same thing as reality.

I must have my brief to go upon. Now if I had not had the main outlines of my caliph story, I could not have made anything of it. You don’t want any outlines. You invent from the beginning. I admire you fellows; entertaining at the same time a kind of disrespect and distrust for you.

_Milverton._ Complete admiration is not at all in your way, my dear Ellesmere. If I were to find you indulging in it, I should be sure that a serious illness was coming upon you.

But, to revert to our main point: I will have a story ready by the next time we meet--that is, if Alick here will help me;--one that I have thought over for years: a true one: at least one which I know has happened in the world’s history. But, if I agree to narrate such a story, will you promise not to interrupt? Such interruptions as you make are, no doubt, very droll; but, I assure you, they do embarrass a narrator. Sir Arthur bore your interruptions nobly. You know he is accustomed to be listened to with reverence. Great authors are not the mere temporary rubbish that eminent lawyers are, and must be treated differently.

_Ellesmere._ Well, I have heard insulting things in the course of my life, but never anything to equal your last remark.

_Milverton_ (who could hardly refrain from laughing). You see, my dear Ellesmere, one must make you know your place, while Sir Arthur is here.

_Ellesmere._ And there is my wife following him up and down the lawn, like an obedient poodle-dog, listening, no doubt, to his sentimental nonsense, as if it were heaven-descended wisdom, thinking all the time what a rough pippin her Sir John is. If I once get away from here, no more of the society of authors for me, nothing but that of Masters in Chancery, solid merchants, and Under-Secretaries of State.

Sir, I abjure all vagabonds. But, Milverton, do pound Sir Arthur with a grand story, so full of daring fiction, that his inventions, in comparison with yours, shall seem to be crystal truths. The honour of our side of the House is at stake. Take Sandy [Sir John Ellesmere would always call me Sandy] into your confidence. As half a Scotchman, he has second-sight at his command. Good-bye: I am going to fish. Now do look at that deluded person, Lady Ellesmere! You see, from that respectful stooping of the shoulders, though they have their backs turned to us, how she is drinking in discourse about the “true” and the “beautiful,” and the “absolute,” and the “uncouth,” with a big U, which means her respected husband. I’ll pitch into that fellow after dinner.

[_Exit_ Sir J. Ellesmere.

_Milverton._ Come to my study, Alick; we will see if we cannot tell them something which will be new to them, and astonish their weak minds.

I have always been very suspicious about this fishing of Sir John Ellesmere’s. I am sure he is up to some mischief or other.[2]

Footnote 2:

I have since found out all about Sir John Ellesmere’s fishing, by consulting my little friend, Jemmy Veck, who haunts the river that Sir John pretends to fish. “Well, Jemmy,” I said, “and so a great London gentleman comes here and catches a good many fish; more than you can catch.” Jemmy grinned, and said: “A’ never caught a fish as I seed; a’ gets his line fuzzed up in the bushes many a time. Lor! a’ can’t fish at all! A’ drags his fly far under the water. A’ went and caught two or three little ones for un t’other day, but a’ didn’t seem to want ’em at all. ‘Well,’ he said to I, ‘why couldn’t ee have thrown ’em into the water again, poor things!’ The big trout under the wooden bridge knows un by this time, and seems quite pleased to see un; and they look at one another for ten minutes together without moving. Oh! the trout is very fond of company, when it knows there is no harm; and I don’t believe that gentleman ever caught a fish in his life.”

So it is evident that Sir John makes his fishing a mere pretext for getting a few hours to himself, during which time I suppose he thinks over his speeches. But the fuss he made about those little trout that Jemmy caught for him, was something to have seen. He insisted upon their being placed upon a separate dish by themselves, and taking upon himself the helping, giving each of us a little bit as if it was some sacred food: declaring there was never anything so good brought to table. He also informed us that to catch a big trout was no difficulty whatever; but that the real piscatorial skill was shown in catching small ones, as he had done for us. I declare he so overpowered us with talk that we thought we were eating something wonderful.