his pace, but heard one say, "He's nobody; he hasn't even got a horse."

"Yes he is," replied the serving-woman; "he's Oliver's brother; and I
can tell you my lord Oliver is somebody; the Princess Lucia--" and she
made the motion of kissing with her lips. Felix, ashamed and annoyed to
the last degree, stepped rapidly from the spot. The serving-woman,
however, was right in a measure; the real or supposed favour shown
Oliver by the Prince's sister, the Duchess of Deverell, had begun to be
bruited abroad, and this was the secret reason why the Baron had shown
Oliver so much and so marked an attention, even more than he had paid to
Lord Durand.

Full well he knew the extraordinary influence possessed by ladies of
rank and position. From what we can learn out of the scanty records of
the past, it was so even in the days of the ancients; it is a
hundredfold more so in these times, when, although every noble must of
necessity be taught to read and write, as a matter of fact the men do
neither, but all the correspondence of kings and princes, and the
diplomatic documents, and notices, and so forth, are one and all, almost
without a single exception, drawn up by women. They know the secret and
hidden motives of courts, and have this great advantage, that they can
use their knowledge without personal fear, since women are never
seriously interfered with, but are protected by all.

The one terrible and utterly shameful instance to the contrary had not
occurred at the time of which we are now speaking, and it was and is
still repudiated by every man, from the knight to the boys who gather
acorns for the swine. Oliver himself had no idea whatever that he was
regarded as a favourite lover of the Duchess; he took the welcome that
was held out to him as perfectly honest. Plain, straightforward, and