minute. Jolly woman, Cecy; not a bit superstitious. I don't know that it would do to tell her the other tag to the story, though."

"What's the other tag ?" asked Sir Cecil in a sleepy tone.

"Just this: people who believe in the ghost have it that, as the succession from father to son was broken by the first importation of a foreign wife among the Marlesdales, so it will go away from this branch altogether by a second. Shouldn't like to try her nerves with that, eh ?"

"I shouldn't mind," said Sir Cecil; "she's much too plucky to care-a stunner like her!"

CHAPTER II.

TWELFTH-NIGHT,

THE Christmas festivities at Burnham Castle were on a splendid scale, and eminently successful. Guests staying in the house, and those who came to the long succession of dinner-parties, were alike gratified. Public opinion was decidedly in favour of Lady Burnham. Sir Cecil Morse found a unanimous consent among the gentlemen to his proposition that Lady Burnham was "a stunner," and she made progress in the favour of all, with the exception of the Countess and Lady Blanche. With the former she made no way, and the latter regarded her, from the far-removed level of her own sanctity, as an objectionable person, who was fortunately rich. Lord Marlesdale "took to" his daughter-in-law even more decidedly than he had done in the summer, and his wife had sufficient sense not to desire that her own prejudice should be shared by others. But that prejudice remained unshaken. The Countess had not been well lately, had been "nervous,” and so gave way to it, and brooded over the unpleasant association of ideas which had established itself in her mind with Lady Burnham's presence. The unconscious Adeline was obnoxious to her ladyship for another reason, in addition to her likeness to the wicked and beautiful French countess her lamentable religion, and her "independent ways;" which latter, though Lady Marlesdale did not even theoretically object to pride as manifested by persons of condition, were especially unpleasant when they became the medium of expressing entire though scrupulously-polite indifference to the magnificent mother-in-law who did not happen to like her. Adeline would have been glad if she had liked her, as she did not it was a pity; but that was all about it. The matter cost Lady Burnham few regrets, and she had not again mentioned it to her husband. But she had not the least notion that Lady Marlesdale chose to resent the fact that there was not as yet any prospect of an heir as a grievance; and that, in some extraordinary conglomeration of prejudice and dislike, she cherished an idea that it was all the fault of Adeline's being a foreigner. Respectable Christian women, who belonged to county families and valued their

privileges properly, stayed at home, and had children decorously and duly; but of course these flaunting foreign women cared only for their pleasures, and were incapable of making any sacrifice to duty or to health. This when her daughter-in-law was making herself agreeable with all her might to Lady Marlesdale's guests, and when she was the very picture of blooming, radiant health. The truth was, Lady Marlesdale remembered the superstition concerning a second foreign marriage in the Raby family, and she allowed it-half ashamed of herself for doing so the while-to prey upon her mind.

Lord Burnham was very busy. There was little doubt that he would be the successful candidate when the next election for the county should take place. His wife did not miss him so much during the long hours of the day as she had done immediately after their return to Burnham Castle. She was preoccupied about something which evidently amused and interested her. The mamzell associated but little, for many days after that unexpected journey of hers to London, with the other servants, and on the rare occasions when she did make her appearance, she was at once inquisitive and reticentreticent about herself and her lady, inquisitive about the family history, and especially about the family ghost. The infidelity of foreigners, in every station of life, was too well known, too thoroughly understood, among the servants at Burnham, to admit of their feeling any surprise when the mamzell announced-on being told the story of the Brown Lady, with many amendments and additions-that she did not believe in ghosts, that she never had believed in them, and never should, unless she should happen to see one, which she did not think at all likely. The servants'-hall company could not agree with her; nothing would surprise them less than that she should see the ghost, the identical Brown Lady herself; their private opinion being that, as a foreigner, she might appear to a foreigner; which of course no Englishborn ghost of good family would condescend to do. The mamzell heard this flattering prophecy with a sneer, and thus provoked the indignation of the servants, who prized the Burnham ghost as the most ancient as well as the most interesting in the county.

*

The party assembled at Burnham for the celebration of the good old festival of Twelfth-night was unusually numerous and lively. It included many young people for whom the attractions of drawing for the king, snap-dragon, and dancing were provided-the staying company in the house, and some officers, friends of Sir Cecil Morse and Captain Crawford, who had thought it well worth their while to run up from Portsmouth for a few days; not a little incited thereto by Sir Cecil's animated description of Lady Burnham, of whom he said, “If she's a stunner in town, by Jove! where there are other women to be seen-and nobody will deny it-she's simply an out-and-outer in a country house, where there's a lot of old women, and that dreadful

Blanche Raby, enough to make a fellow bilious to look at her, by Jove!"

In the smoking-room on the night before Twelfth-day, Lord Burnham being absent, Captain Crawford told the story of the Brown Lady once more, and with great success. The officers from Portsmouth were quite pleased, and almost excited, by the narrative; and one, a young lieutenant, who imagined himself an authority on beauty and style, and who believed, in his honest and simple conceit, that no woman, not even the "match" of the Brown Lady herself, could possibly resist him, proposed an adjournment en masse to inspect the famous portrait. But Captain Crawford opposed this proceeding, on the grounds that the house was all quiet for the night, and of course the gas had been turned out in the picture-gallery. With the majority of the little party this argument succeeded, and the notion was abandoned; but Tommy Toxteth was not to be persuaded.

66

"Bother the gas!" said the youth; come along, Crawford; let the others stay here-they've seen the picture, and I haven't; I have never been through the gallery at all. Let's take a candle apiece and go-the Brown Lady will look all the more ghastly, or ghostly, in the dim light."

"By Jove! you're developing, Tommy," said Sir Cecil Morse; "you're actually displaying imagination! What next?"

"Don't bother," returned the lieutenant; "come along."

Captain Crawford enjoyed, and deserved, the reputation of a very good-natured sort of fellow, and he rose, though rather lazily, to comply with Tommy Toxteth's request. The two made their way to the staircase, at the foot of which one door of the picture-gallery was situated. The candles they carried gave but a dim light in the large, empty space, and Tommy Toxteth declared he already felt "creepy," when Captain Crawford opened the door, and they entered the gallery-just in time to see a woman's figure vanish at the opposite end. The lieutenant started violently, and tumbled up against Captain Crawford, who, not so much disconcerted, but still not completely unmoved, caught him by the arm, and said,

"Take care; you'll drop the candle."

"Bother the candle!" returned Tommy; "did you see that?" "I saw a woman, certainly-one of the servants, I suppose." "Do you? Why do you speak in a whisper, then? And why does any servant in the house wear a brown dress with a train ?"

"Are you certain of that? The gallery is long, and the light is dim."

"I am perfectly certain, and I have remarkably good sight."

Tommy Toxteth leaned most unceremoniously against one of the family portraits as he spoke, and rubbed his evening-dressed shoulders against the white-satin knee of a Raby of the time of George II. Captain Crawford looked at him blankly.

"I say," said Tommy, "we shall get preciously chaffed if we let out that, having come to look at the portrait, we have seen the ghost. Come and let's have a peep at the picture, at all events."

Without speaking, Crawford advanced to the portrait, and the two men held the lights they carried so as to show it to the best advantage. The picture looked even more life-like in the feeble light than in the brightness of the gas jets. The proud, beautiful face; the bright, yet soft and speaking eyes; the graceful figure, which seemed coming forward to meet the gazers-all had a striking, an overpowering effect, which told on the young lieutenant, though he did his best to throw it off. They looked at the picture for some time, but in silence, and when they turned away from it and left the gallery, they still did not speak, until they had reached the first landing on the stair.

"All a fancy of ours, of course," said Crawford; "either a mere imagination, or a clever housemaid, who chooses the unfrequented gallery for a rendezvous with her footman lover."

"Why did we not see the footman lover, then ?" asked the lieutenant, with more presence of mind than was habitual to him; "and how do you explain the dress ?"

"You must have imagined the dress," said Captain Crawford. "And you the footman," returned the lieutenant.

More time than they had supposed had elapsed while the two had been absent, and they found the smoking-room forsaken by all but Sir Cecil Morse and a middle-aged individual of no particular persuasion or profession, who was an inveterate smoker, and liked his cigars in company. Mr. Netterville never left the smoking-room until everyone else had departed, and would endeavour, by every device of good-fellowship, to keep the last of the habitués up "just ten minutes longer." Mr. Netterville had been acting the "demmed fascinating rattlesnake" in the case of Sir Cecil Morse; but that baronet was on the point of making his escape when Captain Crawford and Tommy Toxteth returned to the smoking-room. Delighted at the idea of detaining them there for a while, he affected great interest in the story they had heard, and the portrait they had gone to see, and plied them with questions. But neither responded according to his wont. Captain Crawford's manner had not its usual ease, and Tommy Toxteth was deficient in fluency. Sir Cecil remarked this, and said carelessly,

"What ails you both? Anyone would think you had seen a ghost!"

"I am not sure that we have not," said Tommy Toxteth, "and the ghost too."

"What!" said Sir Cecil, with an incredulous grin, "the Brown Lady herself?"

"Yes, the Brown Lady herself."

"Nonsense," said Sir Cecil; "why, I thought you did not believe in it, Craw ?"

"So I thought myself until to-night," said Crawford; "and I am not quite sure that I do believe in it now; but, on the other hand, I'm not quite sure that I don't."

Mr. Netterville and Sir Cecil insisted on an explanation, which the others gave; and the surprise caused by the story was all they could have desired, had they been telling it for effect. Mr. Netterville was fully gratified that night; the sitting lasted until even he had had enough of cigars and conversation. The two men who had or had not seen the ghost were remarkably unimaginative, and the more they discussed the matter, the less they could believe that they had only fancied what they had seen, but the less also they liked to subscribe fully to belief in the supernatural. No satisfactory conclusion, therefore, was come to, and it was Mr. Netterville who suggested that the truth might be tested by watching for the ghost on another night.

"Unless the Brown Lady is very much altered for the better," he said laughing, "she is not likely to miss a chance of being seen."

"And let me tell you," said Tommy Toxteth, with a dismal attempt at a joke, "to see even the ghost of such a woman as the Brown Lady, is not to be sneezed at."

"What a tremendous admirer of beauty you are, Tommy!" said Sir Cecil; "it might be enough for you to have the chance of looking at Lady Burnham every day for a week. If you want a real live stunner, there's one for you."

"For you you mean," said Tommy, trying to disguise nervousness by affected facetiousness.

66

Suppose we all watch for the Brown Lady to-morrow night," said Sir Cecil; "it's Twelfth-night, the time she is said to appear quite regularly. If she does, we'll agree not to be in the least frightened; and if she does not, to set down Craw and Tommy for a pair of pol

troons."

"Agreed," said Mr. Netterville; and he then added reflectively, "What a deuced unpleasant thing for a family it must be to have a hereditary ghost! If I had one, which I have not-the Nettervilles are not important enough for that I should have had a shot at it long ago."

"A shot at it!" exclaimed Crawford-" a shot at a ghost!"

66

Certainly," replied Mr. Netterville; "if such things exist, why not learn all there is to be learned about them? It is a popular belief, quite as profound as belief in the existence of ghosts, that if you see one, and fire at it with a bullet-I am not sure whether the bullet must be silver, but I think not-it will never appear again; a cheap and simple remedy for intrusive spirits. You say Lady Marlesdale has a great dislike to the Burnham ghost; why has she not tried this method of appeal to the superstition of the servants and other people who believe in it, and persuade themselves they have seen it? They would believe in the efficacy of the shot as much as in the presence