her. Men in love are children with their mistresses--the greatest of
them; their heads are under the woman's feet. What have I not done to
aid him! At his instance, I went to the archbishop, to implore one of
the princes of the Church for succour. I knelt to an ecclesiastic.
I did a ludicrous and a shameful thing, knowing it in advance to be a
barren farce. I obeyed his wish. The tale will be laughable. I obeyed
him. I would not have it on my conscience that the commission of any
deed ennomic, however unwonted, was refused by me to serve Alvan. You
are my witness, Tresten, that for a young woman of common honesty I was
ready to pack and march. Qualities of mind-mind! They were out of the
question. He had a taste for a wife. If he had hit on a girl commonly
honest, she might not have harmed him--the contrary; cut his talons.
What is this girl? Exactly what one might be sure his appreciation, in
woman-flesh, would lead him to fix on; a daughter of the Philistines,
naturally, and precisely the one of all on earth likely to confound him
after marriage as she has played fast and loose with him before it. He
has never understood women--cannot read them. Could a girl like that
keep a secret? She's a Cressida--a creature of every camp! Not an idea
of the cause he is vowed to! not a sentiment in harmony with it! She is
viler than any of those Berlin light o' loves on the eve of Jena. Stable
as a Viennese dancing slut home from Mariazell! This is the girl-
transparent to the whole world! But his heart is on her, and he must
have her, I suppose; and I shall have to bear her impertinences, or sign
my demission and cease to labour for the cause at least in conjunction
with Alvan. And how other wise? He is the life of it, and I am doomed
to uselessness.'

Tresten nodded a protesting assent.

'Not quite so bad,' he said, with the encouraging smile which could