CHAPTER III.

A FETE IN PARIS NOT AT ALL PARISIAN.

HE

while she went to let them know he was come ?"

Maurice followed her into the hall, which contained a table and chairs of curito match. There

THE

before the Revolution been inhabited

by people of rank and fashion. Its houses were Gothic, built with a strength and solidity to defy centuries of time, and with an artistic beauty and richness of ornament which would have filled Mr. Ruskin or any of his disciples with rapture, but the taste of later days having condemned their architecture as barbarous, they had been abandoned to that numerous class of persons who endeavour to support what is called a respectable appearance on narrow and precarious means. It was a very quiet street and tolerably clean, and as Maurice entered it, the evening sun half lighted up the antique buildings with a golden glory, half left them in soft and beautiful shadow, producing a variety of picturesque effects which delighted the young painter.

'Truly, this is not an unfit abode for an artist," thought Maurice, as he looked up at Marguerite's dwelling with its stone porch, its deeply embayed windows, and their rich. ornamental tracery and mouldings.

The door was opened by Mère Monica, whose quaint figure and antiquated costume were in perfect keeping with the Gothic porch Maurice had been admiring, and the grey stone hall from which she had emerged. Her small, sharp, clearly marked features, and eyes full of quickness and life, were surmounted by a high Norman cap of white muslin, and her square figure was clad in a black petticoat and jacket, with a huge white apron; a bunch of keys, a pair of scissors, a pin-cushion, and some sort of knitting apparatus hanging at her waist. She received Maurice very graciously, and in answer to his inquiries told him that Clarie was much better. "Both the Demoiselles were in the garden," she said. "So was Monsieur, their father. Would Monsieur Valaze walk in

was a high Gothic window looking towards the street, the upper part richly stained, crimson, blue, and gold; the lower half wreathed with a screen of living ivy, after the German fashion. In the recess of the window stood a large arm-chair, and a table on which lay two or three books and a German pipe. From the hall Mère Monica conducted him into a little sitting room, and, requesting him to wait there till she found Mademoiselle Marguerite, she opened a glass door and passed into the garden. This little parlour had an air of cheerful life and comfort about it which Maurice scarcely expected to find in that gloomy old house. It was furnished in a very inexpensive and simple style, but he fancied he could discern the fine taste and graceful touch of the artist in its arrangements. There was a pretty green and white paper on the walls, the curtains were of striped white and green chintz, the couches, chairs,and tables, though of very common material, were of forms that pleased even the fastidious taste of Maurice. There were some water colour landscapes in pretty wood frames, which he never doubted to be the work of Marguerite, and their merit increased the high opinion he had already formed of her genius. Vases filled with China roses gave a fresh and delicate brightness to the room, and on a stand near the window was a basket, the centre one mass of sweet violets, the sides wreathed with living ivy. Between the windows stood a small bookcase, and Maurice saw with surprise that most of the books it contained were English and German. As it seemed to him that Marguerite's hand and taste were visible in every other part of the room, he could not help concluding that these books had been chosen by her; yet, according to his ideas, some of them were calculated more

"I hope she is not too much of a femme savante," thought Maurice; but this fear was instantly put to flight as the glass door again opened and Marguerite entered. Her hair was plainly folded back from her forehead, and coiled round her head, and her dress, a grey gingham gown, was plain enough for any learned lady; but then it was fresh and spotless, neatly made, and neatly put on, and she looked so gentle and unaffected, spoke to Maurice with so quiet, yet so sweet a voice, shook hands with him so frankly, and invited him to the garden, where her father and Clarie were, so pleasantly, that he at once exonerated her from any unwomanly acquaintance with science and philosophy, and even forgot for the moment how little of the beauty he deemed essential to woman, she possessed.

The garden was large, well-filled, and in good order; a great abundance of vegetables grew there, and fruit trees were trained against the walls. In the middle was a trellised arbour, covered with grape vines, and in front of the arbour was a grass plot, bordered with beds of flowers. Early as the season was, pansies, auriculas, hyacinths and tulips bloomed there in profusion, filling the air with their delicious fragrance. Monsieur Kneller was sitting on the grass plot in a wheeled chair, and at his feet sat Clarie, her straw hat, gay with pink ribands, lying beside her, and her bruised arm in a sling. She was reading a volume of Beranger's poems to her father, but as Maurice approached, she tossed it away, as if glad to be released from an irksome task.

"Oh, I am so glad you have come," she exclaimed; "now I may stop reading."

"And I am glad that I may thank you for your kindness to this troublesome girl," said her father. "You will excuse me for not getting up to welcome you, when you know that I cannot rise without being helped."

Monsieur Kneller was at least sixty years

was.

more German than French in its form, and something also of his German ancestry in his grave face and slow manner. He was instantly pleased with Maurice Valazé's pleasant looks and ways, as almost everyone Maurice had the gift of winning hearts, and ere long the little group in the garden were as good friends as if they had been known to each other for years. Monsieur Kneller was a passionate admirer of Beranger's lyrics, and he found that Maurice's knowledge and appreciation of that poet of the people was scarcely inferior to his own. Delighted with his young guest, he invited him to stay and take coffee, and suggested that as the evening was so summer-like, they should have a little fête in the garden; a proposal to which the girls eagerly assented, and which was warmly applauded by Maurice. Clarie ran into the house to coax Mère Monica to make some of her best cakes for the occasion, and when she returned her father sent her and Maurice to help Marguerite, who was gathering strawberries.

"You must make a basket for them, Marguerite," said Clarie, when they had gathered enough; one like that you made on my birthday." And darting away, she returned in a minute with some vine leaves, which she threw into her sister's lap. With these the dexterous fingers of Marguerite soon wove a graceful and picturesque little basket, and, when it was piled high with bunches of the rich coral fruit, Maurice declared it was worthy of being made immortal.

"By whom?" asked Clarie, saucily.

"By me," answered Maurice,—" I intend to become a great painter, just for the purpose of transmitting this chef d'œuvre to the admiration of future ages."

"I don't think you will ever become a great painter," said Clarie, demurely; "you look too gay. If you were to see Marguerite, how grave she looks when she is painting."

"I have seen her," said Maurice.

Oh, have you? Where, then?" exclaimed Clarie." But of course it was in the Luxembourg yesterday."

"Yes, and before yesterday."

the brilliant sallies of wit and fancy with which Maurice, who was in a humour to enjoy everything and make others enjoy it also, enlivened the repast, and the quiet delight

66

Grave, do you call it? I should say rapt, inspired, like the muse of painting herself." "Oh, indeed! that is a grand compliment, but Marguerite does not care for compliments."

"I am not worthy to pay her compliments," said Maurice; "but if I were as great a painter as Eugene Delacroix———”

"Ah!" exclaimed Marguerite, who had not seemed to hear them before, but now looked up with a vivid blush, and met Maurice's eager and sympathetic glance, "you heard him. I have sometimes felt since as if it was all a dream. But come," she added, hastily, "I must go and prepare the table, or Mère Monica will be here with her cakes and coffee before we are ready for them."

And when the table was spread with a snowy cloth, pretty pencilled china cups and plates, and bright spoons and forks, with delicious little French rolls, fresh butter and sweet cream, which Mère Monica always seemed able to provide as if by magic; when to these were added exquisite cakes and coffee, Marguerite's vine-leaf basket with its tempting store, and a bouquet of flowers in the centre; when these dainties were crowned by the good-natured hospitality of Monsieur Kneller, the girlish joyousness of Clarie,

every lover of simple and natural pleasures might have envied.

Pleased and animated, Marguerite looked so much better than Maurice had till now thought she could ever look, that he began to consider her, if not pretty, yet something better. He remembered what the lady said whom Carlyle quotes when speaking of Varnhagen Von Ense's famous wife, Rachel, "Are not all beautiful faces ugly to begin with ?” He now remarked that the shape of her head was fine and noble, and her forehead and brows beautiful; that her dark eyes were deep and soft; her smile sweet and bright, and her black hair glossy, silken, and abundant. Clarie was very unlike her sister, and Maurice thought much plainer. Her features were delicate, but her complexion was pale and sallow. Her thinness made her blue eyes look too large and too light, and her fair hair was all tucked away under a green silk net, which made her look almost ghastly. But, pretty or plain, Maurice liked his new friends, and this evening reminded him of the pleasant home-life he had left behind him in sunny Provence. He gladly accepted Monsieur Kneller's invitation to come and see them again; and left them at sunset, determined to do so as speedily as possible.

(To be continued.)

ferent from those of the brutes was an opinion held by many of the ancient writers. Horace expresses this view in a very definite form in the well-known and often-quoted lines:

"Quum prorepserunt primis animalia terris,

Mutum et turpe pecus, glandem atque cubilia propter
Unguibus et pugnis, dein fustibus, atque ita porro
Pugnabant armis quæ post fabricaverat usus,
Donec verba, quibus voces sensusque notarent,
Nominaque invenere; dehinc absistere bello,
Oppida cœperunt munire et ponere leges."*

Even Rome, however, produced men who held a different opinion to the one expressed in this celebrated passage; and the nineteenth century, if it has not left the controversy just where it was in the time of Horace, has nevertheless failed as yet to arrive at a satisfactory conclusion as to man's place in nature. Now-a-days, every theory must be able to give scientific grounds for its existence, and vigorous attempts have been made recently to place the dictum of Horace upon a basis of scientific fact. It is the object of the present paper to examine how far these endeavours may be said to have succeeded; and in so doing it is not necessary to consider more than one of these attempts, Mr. Darwin's work on the "Descent of Man.”

It is to be borne in mind, however, that the limits of a Magazine article will only permit of allusion being made to some of the more

* "When animals first crept forth from the newlyformed earth, a dumb and filthy herd, they fought for acorns and lurking places with their nails and fists, then with clubs, and at last with arms, which, taught by experience, they had forged. They then invented names for things, and words to express their thoughts, after which they began to desist from war, to fortify cities, and enact laws."

salient points of such a vast and intricate subject.

The difficulty which is generally felt as to man's place in nature, is well expressed by the different schemes of zoological classifi cation adopted by different writers on natural history. Thus, some authorities place man in a distinct "sub-kingdom," or primary division of the animal kingdom; others give him the rank of a distinct class; others reduce his privileges to that of a separate order; whilst others, finally, consider that man's peculiarities are so few and so little marked that he may be considered as a subdivision of a common order with the monkeys. It is, therefore, worth our while to consider shortly what are the grounds upon which man's position in the zoological scale may justifiably be fixed, or, in other words, what points ought properly to be included in the zoological definition of man.

As to his mere anatomical structure, man differs from the man-like apes chiefly in his habitually erect posture; in having the hind limbs exclusively devoted to locomotion, whilst the fore-limbs are equally exclusively devoted to acts of grasping; in having a thumb capable of being brought in contact with the extremities of the other digits, whilst the great toe is not so "opposable;" in having no general covering of hair on the body; in having an even and uninterrupted series of teeth; and in having the largest, most highly developed, and most richly convoluted brain in the entire series of the quadrupeds. Many naturalists would consider, as we think with great reason, that these anatomical differences taken by themselves are amply sufficient to entitle man to claim at any rate the place of a distinct order in the