'This is a world in which our brightest day-dreams generally end in
mere dreaming. For years past I have cherished the hope of
presenting you to your sovereign, to whom I was presented six and
forty years ago, when she was so fair and girlish a creature that
she seemed to me more like a queen in a fairy tale than the actual
ruler of a great country. I have beguiled my monotonous days with
thoughts of the time when I should return to the great world, full
of pride and delight in showing old friends what a sweet flower I
had reared in my mountain home; but, alas, Lesbia, it may not be.

'Fate has willed otherwise. The maimed hand does not recover,
although Horton is very clever, and thoroughly understands my case.
I am not ill, I am not in danger; so you need feel no anxiety about
me; but I am a cripple; and I am likely to remain a cripple for
months; so the idea of a London season this year is hopeless.

'Now, as you have in a manner made your _début_ at Cannes, it would
never do to bury you here for another year. You complained of the
dullness last summer; but you would find Fellside much duller now
that you have tasted the elixir of life. No, my dear love, it will
be well for you to be presented, as Lady Kirkbank proposes, at the
first drawing-room after Easter; and Lady Kirkbank will have to
present you. She will be pleased to do this, I know, for her letters
are full of enthusiasm about you. And, after all, I do not think you
will lose by the exchange. Clever as I think myself, I fear I should
find myself sorely at fault in the society of to-day. All things are
changed: opinions, manners, creeds, morals even. Acts that were
crimes in my day are now venial errors--opinions that were
scandalous are now the mark of "advanced thought." I should be too
formal for this easy-going age, should be ridiculed as old-fashioned