upsets me with his long words and his--his awful views. He really does."

"I tell him he is the Antichrist," observed Don Francesco, gravely
shaking his head. "But we shall see! We shall catch him yet."

The Duchess had no idea what the Antichrist was, but she felt sure it
was something not quite nice.

"If I thought he was anything like that, I would never ask him to my
house again. The Antichrist! Ah, talk of angels--"

The person in question suddenly appeared, superintending half a dozen
young gardeners who carried various consignments of plants wrapped up
in straw which had arrived, presumably, by the steamer.

Mr. Keith was older than he looked--incredibly old, in fact, though
nobody could bring himself to believe it; he was well preserved by
means of a complicated system of life, the details of which, he used to
declare, were not fit for publication. That was only his way of
talking. He exaggerated so dreadfully. His face was clean-shaven, rosy,
and of cherubic fulness; his eyes beamed owlishly through spectacles
which nobody had ever seen him take off. But for those spectacles he
might have passed for a well-groomed baby in a soap-advertisement. He
was supposed to sleep in them.

It looked as if Mr. Keith had taken an instantaneous liking to the
bishop.

"Bampopo? Why, of course. I've been there. Years and years ago. Long
before your time, I'm afraid. How is the place getting on? Better