lecture that night, on her reckless exhibition of feeling; but it
profited little. The most consummate cunning could not have baffled
Argemone's suspicions more completely than her sister's utter
simplicity. She cried just as bitterly about Mops's danger as about
the keeper's, and then laughed heartily at Argemone's solemnity;
till at last, when pushed a little too hard, she broke out into
something very like a passion, and told her sister, bitterly enough,
that 'she was not accustomed to see men drowned every day, and
begged to hear no more about the subject.' Whereat Argemone
prudently held her tongue, knowing that under all Honoria's
tenderness lay a volcano of passionate determination, which was
generally kept down by her affections, but was just as likely to be
maddened by them. And so this conversation only went to increase
the unconscious estrangement between them, though they continued, as
sisters will do, to lavish upon each other the most extravagant
protestations of affection--vowing to live and die only for each
other--and believing honestly, sweet souls, that they felt all they
said; till real imperious Love came in, in one case of the two at
least, shouldering all other affections right and left; and then the
two beauties discovered, as others do, that it is not so possible or
reasonable as they thought for a woman to sacrifice herself and her
lover for the sake of her sister or her friend. Next morning
Lancelot and the colonel started out to Tregarva's cottage, on a
mission of inquiry. They found the giant propped up in bed with
pillows, his magnificent features looking in their paleness more
than ever like a granite Memnon. Before him lay an open Pilgrim's
Progress, and a drawer filled with feathers and furs, which he was
busily manufacturing into trout flies, reading as he worked. The
room was filled with nets, guns, and keepers' tackle, while a well-
filled shelf of books hung by the wall.