yourself."

"Oh, you consider me presumptuous and arrogant; but that is common
report, and you do right, perhaps, to believe it."

"Was there ever any one unconscious of his own merit?" asked Lady
Florence, proudly. "They who distrust themselves have good reason for
it."

"You seek to cure the wound you inflicted," returned Maltravers,
smiling.

"No; what I said was an apology for myself, as well as for you. You
need no words to vindicate you; you are a man, and can bear out all
arrogance with the royal motto /Dieu et mon droit/. With you deeds can
support pretension; but I am a woman--it was a mistake of Nature."

"But what triumphs that man can achieve bring so immediate, so palpable
a reward as those won by a woman, beautiful and admired--who finds every
room an empire, and every class her subjects?"

"It is a despicable realm."

"What!--to command--to win--to bow to your worship--the greatest, and
the highest, and the sternest; to own slaves in those whom men recognise
as their lords! Is such a power despicable? If so, what power is to be
envied?"

Lady Florence turned quickly round to Maltravers, and fixed on him her
large dark eyes, as if she would read into his very heart. She turned