and antagonisms, fortune and misfortune, of men and women more or less like individuals whom most of us know, it is keenly interesting.

Mrs. Ward's literary method is that of George Eliot; indeed, there is a curious affinity in Robert Elsmere to Adam Bede-though there is perhaps not an incident, possibly no play of character, or acute side-light or vivifying suggestion that could be found in both, while the plot and general scheme are entirely dissimilar.”

OXFORD.

The weather was all that the heart of man could desire, and the party met on Paddington platform with every prospect of another successful day. Forbes turned up punctual to the moment, and radiant under the combined influence of the sunshine and of Miss Bretherton's presence; Wallace had made all the arrangements perfectly, and the six friends found themselves presently journeying along to Oxford. . . At last the "dreaming spires" of Oxford rose from the green, river-threaded plain, and they were at their journey's end. A few more minutes saw them alighting at the gate of the new Balliol, where stood Herbert Sartoris looking out for them. He was a young don with a classical edition on hand which kept him working up after term, within reach of the libraries, and he led the way to some pleasant rooms overlooking the inner quadrangle of Balliol, showing in his well-bred look and manner an abundant consciousness of the enormous good fortune which had sent him Isabel Bretherton for a guest. For at that time it was almost as difficult to obtain the presence of Miss Bretherton at any social festivity as it was to obtain that of royalty. Her Sundays were the objects of conspiracies for weeks beforehand. on the part of those persons in London society who were least accustomed to have their invitations refused, and to have and to hold the famous beauty for more than an hour in his own rooms, and then to enjoy the

privilege of spending five or six long hours on the river with her, were delights which, as the happy young man felt, would render him the object of envy to all—at least of his fellow-dons below forty.

In streamed the party, filling up the book-lined rooms and starting the two old scouts in attendance into unwonted rapidity of action. Miss Bretherton wandered around, surveyed the familiar Oxford luncheon-table, groaning under the time-honored summer fare, the books, the engravings, and the sunny, irregular quadrangle outside, with its rich adornings of green, and threw herself down at last on to the low window-seat with a sigh of satisfaction.

"How quiet you are! how peaceful; how delightful it must be to live here! It seems as if one were in another world from London. Tell me what that building is over there; it's too new, it ought to be old and gray like the colleges we saw coming up here. Is everybody gone away gone down,' you say? I should like to see all the learned people walking about for once."

"I could show you a good many if there were time," said young Sartoris, hardly knowing, however, what he was saying, so lost was he in admiration of that marvellous changing face. "The vacation is the time they show themselves; it's like owls coming out at night. You see, Miss Bretherton, we don't keep many of them; they are in the way in term-time. But in vacation they have the colleges and the parks and the Bodleian to themselves and their umbrellas, under the most favorable conditions.”

"Oh, yes," said Miss Bretherton, with a little scorn, "people always make fun of what they are proud of. But I mean to believe that you are all learned, and that everybody here works himself to death, and that Oxford is quite, quite perfect!"

"Did you hear what Miss Bretherton was saying, Mrs. Stuart?" said Forbes, when they were seated at luncheon. "Oxford is perfect, she declares already; I don't think I quite like it; it's too hot to last."

"Am I such a changeable creature, then?" said Miss Bretherton, smiling at him. "Do you generally find my enthusiasms cool down?"

"You are as constant as you are kind," said Forbes, bowing to her. "Oh! the good times I've had up here-much better than he ever had "-nodding across at Kendal, who was listening. "He was too properly behaved to enjoy himself; he got all the right things, all the proper first-classes and prizes, poor fellow! But, as for me, I used to scribble over my notebooks all lecture-time, and amuse myself the rest of the day. And then, you see, I was up twenty years earlier than he was, and the world was not as virtuous then as it is now, by a long way."

Kendal was interrupting, when Forbes, who was in one of his maddest moods, turned around upon his chair to watch a figure passing along the quadrangle in front of the bay-window.

"I say, Sartoris, isn't that Camden, the tutor who was turned out of Magdalen a year or two ago for that atheistical book of his, and whom you took in, as you do all the disreputables? Ah, I knew it!

"By the pricking of my thumbs

Something wicked this way comes.'

That's not mine, my dear Miss Bretherton; it's Shakespeare's first, Charles Lamb's afterward. But look at him well-he's a heretic, a real, genuine heretic. Twenty years ago it would have been a thrilling sight; but now, alas! it's so common that it's not the victim but the persecutors who are the curiosity."

"I don't know that," said young Sartoris. "We liberals are by no means the cocks of the walk that we were a few years ago. You see, now we have got nothing to pull against, as it were. So long as we had two or three good grievances, we could keep the party together, and attract all the young men. We were Israel going up against the Philistines, who had us in their grip. But now, things are changed; we've got our way all round, and it's the Church party who have the grievances and the cry. It is we who are the Philistines, and the oppressors in our turn, and, of course, the young men as they grow up are going into the opposition."

"And a very good thing, too!" said Forbes. "It's the only thing that prevents Oxford becoming as dull as