Was

one touch cancel the promise of years? it possible that, in drawing the Ghost's eyes from his picture, she had revenged herself by drawing after them the whole? Justice, not Vengeance, he said to himself; and with a sullen despair confessed that had the Ghost desired those cruel eyes to remain, no power of his could have effaced them. Again alone, his phantasms, and not he, ruled.

Setting down the candle, he stooped forward and searched the work eagerly. Low in one corner, a vermilion fillet close upon a mass of unspeakably precious ultra-marine; further up, some dim outline, obscured by a smoky air that curled across the whole. That was all. But as he searched atom by atom, he caught gleams of his former design, and, recalling by the help of memory line after line, the truth flashed upon his mind. His picture should have been full of purple shades; yellow, neutralized purple. As this idea seized him, the candle, which was flaring in its socket, dipt and fell into darkness, disclosing the moonlight that fell through the panes and overlay his easel. He waited for the effect. Slowly struggling in the beams, the

dubious shades wrought themselves out upon his vision, till with ineffable satisfaction he saw every particle of his work, still undestroyed, resolve dimly in the uncertain light. He would have endured as much more pain for the sharp pleasure that now flushed and filled him. Purple, then, vanished by candle-light, he had discovered; and thus through his own suffering and failures he was instructed. Throwing himself upon the lounge, he slept his first unbroken slumber since he had endeavored to install art in the place of the Ghost.

IV.

THE WINE-CELLAR.

IR ROHAN was awakened at morning by the sound of gay voices on the lawn so long consecrated to silence, and so frequently the battle-ground of the Ghost.

Having performed an unusually elaborate toilet, he paused at an open balcony window in the upper hall, and looked out. The lawn was not large, but, after descending a few terraces, quite even, green, and bordered with azalia-bushes, snowy camellias, purple rhododendrons in their glory, and, where the full wealth of a southern sun lay, a few superb ferns and rosy oleanders; the whole enclosed and sheltered from the Atlantic blasts by mighty firs, dropping their boughs with rings of shadow low upon the sward. grape-vine clambered from branch to branch of these, weaving a natural trellis, and hanging

A

great bunches of dewy beryl and emerald on the sombre green of its support. Here Sir Rohan

had spent the prime of many mornings, striving to weary thought and seeking inspiration for his work while training blossom and tending root; and here the Ghost had always followed him, at first with gentle enticing and sad blandishments, and then with sudden intimations of terror and the whole armory of her ghastly array. Now, near the foot of the lawn, Miriam, having twisted a wreath of the flaming azalias in her black hair one long lock of which already streamed over her white dress, was throwing clusters of the unused blossoms at St. Denys, who repaid her warmly, while after every missile she tossed a laugh. Just as she had raised her hands both of them full of the blazing flowers, a sudden exclamation from St. Denys checked her, and turning swiftly, she saw Sir Rohan at the window above. Slightly abashed at proving herself a romp before this grave, quiet man, she dropped half her trophies and stood irresolute a second, winding the loose tress about her fingers; then, glancing up, she laughed again, threw the remainder of her brilliant store at Sir Rohan, and

spreading her dress in either hand, swept him a broad courtesy.

How the face changes, thought Sir Rohan. What variety of expression! It is like a star on troubled waters when the tide comes in. "St. Denys deserves the happiness he finds in his child," he said, and returning her greeting, he soon joined them at the table.

After breakfast, St. Denys determining to walk to the post-town, Sir Rohan, wrapped in a long cloak, the invariable garb of his wanderings, accompanied him,― leaving Miriam, as she desired, in the tumult caused by the disarray of the drawing-room; where, on returning a few hours later, they found her, still revelling in the confusion, in close communion with Mrs. Redruth, and a bosom friend of half the maids. All the shutters were open, and floods of unwonted sunshine filled the room till every mote was alchemized to gold.

"Another Danae!" said Sir Rohan, as she stood surrounded and transfigured in the radiance.

"A very dusty Jove," returned St. Denys. "It is the way of womankind, however, sir. Since they cannot revenge their wrongs by conquering