I hastened downstairs, possessed with a strange belief; I entered the balcony, passed down the steps, and gained the garden. I walked forward cautiously, peering to right and left, pausing at intervals to listen, then advancing noiselessly as before. Half-way down the grounds I stopped; I heard the sound of footsteps: In a few minutes. a figure in white came out of the gloom and flitted rapidly by me. I called "Geraldine!" She halted. I went up to her.

"My darling, what are you doing in the garden at this hour? The grass is wet, and you are thinly clad."

"Who are you?" she asked in a hard whisper.

"Your husband-Arthur."

"Let me feel you."

I took her hand and led her to the house. She did not speak until we had gained the library. By the light of the candle I saw that her eyes were dilated, her face quite bloodless, her lips thin, white and rigid. "Great God, Geraldine! Speak! What is the matter with you?" I cried.

She

"Let me get to bed-I am weary, weary," she answered. I closed the window and accompanied her to our bedroom. moaned like one under the influence of a narcotic. Her face was almost deformed by the harshness of its expression. Her fingers worked incessantly, like those of an infant in a sick slumber. "Were you walking in your sleep, Geraldine ?" I asked.

She answered with extraordinary quickness, "Yes, I have been walking in my sleep."

"I heard a cry; did you utter it ?"

She laughed quietly, but without the least change of expression. "Who else?-who else?" she replied.

"But did you hurt yourself, that you cried out?"

A shrewd light shone in her eyes as she answered:

"I stumbled; the fall awoke me, and in my fear I cried out."

She began to play with her hair, suddenly desisted, and asked querulously,

"What makes this room red?"

"It is not red, dearest."

.

"I say it is!" she exclaimed, irritably. "The flame of the candle is red-the walls are red-your face is red!"

"Your nerves are excited. The shock of awakening has been too great. Lie down, dearest; you will rise refreshed in the morning."

She seated herself on the edge of the bed, looking at her fingers and turning them about. Presently she began to cry, but very quietly. I went to her and kissed her, clasping her in my arms, for she trembled as though she were cold. And indeed she was; her hands and cheeks were like ice; but her forehead burned. After a little I succeeded in coaxing her into bed, where she lay sighing as though her

heart would break. I watched by her for half an hour, when the regular respiration told me she was asleep.

When she rose next morning she looked very very ill. I was greatly distressed by her appearance and entreated her to remain in bed. But she declared she must get up; what could she do in bed? She had some work in the garden, and must go to it. I could not help taking notice of her constrained manner, as though she addressed me under compulsion. She appeared to have difficulty in articulating her words; and her eyes, which the sickness of her body seemed to make more brilliant, were restless, startled, and impatient. Before leaving the room she said:

"I do not like your friend, Arthur; when will he go?"

"He is going to-day, love."

"Why did he come ?"

Bound to be consistent, I repeated my story of his being a friend whom I had asked to spend a week at Elmore Court, but who now found he would have to return to London that day.

"What time will he leave?"

"In the early part of the afternoon, I think."

"I do not mean to see him. I'll go into the garden and hide myself. Do you know, when he looks at me his eyes give me a pain in the head?"

"I am sure he does not wish to pain you."

"But he does, or he would not look at me like that. And he asks me questions which trouble me to reply to. I won't meet him."

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Very well," I answered, recollecting Dr. F's advice that she should be humoured.

"And do not bring him near me," she continued, "and do not come and look for me, for I shall hide myself until he is gone."

"But you are not strong enough to work in the garden. Why will you not remain indoors? Let Mrs. Williams nurse you a little. You need repose after what happened last night."

"What happened last night ?" she cried, looking sharply up.

If the memory of it had passed I thought it best not to recall it. So I answered:

"I am sure, dearest, you need a little nursing. And should you fatigue yourself in the garden

"Tell me of last night," she whispered, creeping close to me.

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Why," I replied, marking her resolution to be answered, "do you not remember finding yourself walking in your sleep?"

She tossed her hands and laughed out.

"Oh, yes, I remember! But go you downstairs and detain your friend while I pass. I will breakfast in the housekeeper's room. Tell him I am ill and cannot be seen."

"Very well," I answered, reluctantly. It did not please me to leave her to herself. Her face looked wax-like, so delicate and transparent was the white of her skin, and her eyes actually trembled with the light in them, as though they reflected the rays of some flickering flame.

I found Dr. Fin the breakfast-room. I gave him a brief account of what had happened on the previous night, and of her condition. I also acquainted him with the aversion he had inspired her with. He replied that her aversion was an illustration of his influence over insane persons. The first operation of this influence was hate and distrust; but fear soon followed. The motto of the mad doctor, he added, was the expression of the Roman emperor-oderint dum metuant.

"She refuses to meet you," I said, "and has gone to hide herself among the trees. You will require no apology for this behaviour," I added, with a mournful smile.

"You do right to let her have her own way. Yet you see how necessary her dislike makes my departure ?"

"Yes. It is not wholly impossible that her cunning may have conjectured the truth, and that she has guessed your mission."

I should hardly think that; though you are right in accrediting insanity with a power of perception which is often far beyond the reach of intellect. The decay of the brain seems to bring the functions of the spirit into activity. But this perception does not always refer to material things. Its proper dominion is the immaterial. Where reason sees order, insanity witnesses disorder; but, on the other hand, insanity riots in the chaos that lies without the limits of normal thought, and delights in constructing theories and forms from the thrice-confounded abstractions it seems to contemplate."

"This would account for many of its delusions."

"After a fashion. But it is hard to reason on the reasonless. The worst form of madness is the total subversion of the intellectual faculties; when the mind represents everything totally opposite to what it is. I remember hearing of two lovers who went mad through a cruel separation. When they were brought together they recognised each other, but each denied the other to be the beloved one. A distinguished mathematician went mad through mistaking the number 6 for an 0 in all his calculations."

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"We can appreciate the horror of madness when it is brought home to us. Much surely may be done by tenderness and sympathy?" They are both severely taxed. I do not utterly despair of your wife, though she will have to be worse before she is better. My parting advice, Mr. Thorburn, is, to endeavour to ascertain if she is at all troubled in her mind. If a real sorrow lies there it should be

uprooted; if an imaginary woe it must be reasoned away. You must have patience; watch her narrowly; sound her persistently, though with delicacy, and keep her as cheerful as opportunity will allow."

A reference to the time-tables showed a train to be leaving Cornpool at twelve. Having ordered the phaeton to be in readiness, we went for a walk towards the sea. It was his own wish to keep away from the house. The walk was hardly agreeable; my mood was sombre and melancholy, and all my thoughts were with Geraldine. On our return we found the phaeton waiting, and having pressed a cheque into his hand, I bade him farewell.

A Line of French Actresses.

THE English stage has not been wanting in an illustrious line of right royal queens of tragedy. Mrs. Barry is the noble founder, and perhaps the noblest queen of that brilliant line. Then came Mrs. Cibber, Mrs. Pritchard, Mrs. Spranger Barry (Mrs. Crawford), Mrs. Siddons (who hated Mrs. Crawford for not abdicating), and Miss O'Neill, whom Mrs. Siddons equally disliked for coming after her.

With all these the lovers of dramatic literature are well acquainted. Of the contemporary line of French tragedy queens very little is known in this country; nevertheless the dynasty is one of great brilliancy, and the details are not without much dramatic interest.

In the year 1644, in the city of Rouen, there lived a family named Desmares, which family was increased in that year by the birth of a little girl who was christened Marie. Corneille, born in the same city, was then eight-and-thirty years of age. Rouen is now proud of both of them-poet and actress. The actress is only known to fame by her married name. The clever Marie Desmares became the wife of the player, Champmeslé. Monsieur was to Madame very much what poor Mr. Siddons was to his illustrious consort. Madame, or Mademoiselle, or La Champmeslé, as she was called indifferently, associated with Corneille by their common birth-place, was more intimately connected with Racine, who was her senior by five years. La Champmeslé was in her twenty-fifth year when she made her début in Paris as Hermione, in Racine's masterpiece, 'Andromaque.' For a long time Paris could talk of nothing but the new tragedy and the new actress. The part from which the piece takes its name was acted by Mdlle. Duparc, whom Racine had carried off from Molière's company. The author was very much interested in this lady, the wife of a M. Duparc. Madame was, when a widow, the mother of a very posthumous child indeed. The mother died. She was followed to the grave by a troop of the weeping adorers of her former charms, "and," says Racine, alluding to himself, "the most interested of them was half dead as he wept."

The poet was aroused from his grief by a summons from the king, who, in presence of the sensitive Racine's bitterest enemy, Louvois, accused him of having robbed and poisoned his late mistress. The accusation was founded on information given by the infamous woman, Voisin, who was a poisoner by passion and profession, and was executed for her devilish practices. The information was found to be 2 B

VOL. XXXXI.