Cashel Byron's Profession

"Why?"

"Because you are so learned, and he so ignorant. He has no culture

save that of the turf. But perhaps you have more sympathy with his

tastes than he supposes."

"I like him because I have not read the books from which he has

borrowed his opinions. Indeed, from their freshness, I should not be

surprised to learn that he had them at first hand from living men,

or even from his own observation of life."

"I may explain to you, Miss Goff," said Lucian, "that Lord

Worthiugton is a young gentleman--"

"Whose calendar is the racing calendar," interposed Lydia, "and who

interests himself in favorites and outsiders much as Lucian does in

prime-ministers and independent radicals. Would you like to go to

Ascot, Alice?"

Alice answered, as she felt Lucian wished her to answer, that she

had never been to a race, and that she had no desire to go to one.

"You will change your mind in time for next year's meeting. A race

interests every one, which is more than can be said for the opera or

the Academy."

"I have been at the Academy," said Alice, who had made a trip to

London once.

"Indeed!" said Lydia. "Were you in the National Gallery?"

"The National Gallery! I think not. I forget."

"I know many persons who never miss an Academy, and who do not know

where the National Gallery is. Did you enjoy the pictures, Alice?"

"Oh, very much indeed."

"You will find Ascot far more amusing."

"Let me warn you," said Lucian to Alice, "that my cousin's pet

caprice is to affect a distaste for art, to which she is

passionately devoted; and for literature, in which she is profoundly

read."

"Cousin Lucian," said Lydia, "should you ever be cut off from your

politics, and disappointed in your ambition, you will have an

opportunity of living upon art and literature. Then I shall respect

your opinion of their satisfactoriness as a staff of life. As yet

you have only tried them as a sauce."

"Discontented, as usual," said Lucian.

"Your one idea respecting me, as usual," replied Lydia, patiently,

as they entered the station.

The train, consisting of three carriages and a van, was waiting at

the platform. The engine was humming subduedly, and the driver and

fireman were leaning out; the latter, a young man, eagerly watching

two gentlemen who were standing before the first-class carriage, and

the driver sharing his curiosity in an elderly, preoccupied manner.

One of the persons thus observed was a slight, fair-haired man of

about twenty-five, in the afternoon costume of a metropolitan dandy.

Lydia knew the other the moment she came upon the platform as the

Hermes of the day before, modernized by a straw hat, a

canary-colored scarf, and a suit of a minute black-and-white

chess-board pattern, with a crimson silk handkerchief overflowing

the breast pocket of the coat. His hands were unencumbered by stick

or umbrella; he carried himself smartly, balancing himself so

accurately that he seemed to have no weight; and his expression was

self-satisfied and good-humored. But--! Lydia felt that there was a

"but" somewhere--that he must be something more than a handsome,

powerful, and light-hearted young man.