little picture, pot-boilers and all; and now I've got enough to pay my debts and buy a wedding-ring, and give a spread to all the fellows at the 'Star and Garter.' 222

When Kitty could release herself, she made him sit down beside her, and listen to a little sermon.

"You are very clever, Perry," she said, "and I am very fond of you, and we are to be married some day-that's settled. But I want you to understand my view of married life, and when you do, you won't vex me by talking like a baby, as you did just now. You have just got enough money to pay your debts, and to buy a wedding-ring, and give a spread, as you call it which means, I suppose, that when you have cleared yourself, you will have twenty pounds in your pocket. Suppose we marry to-morrow".

"By Jove! I should wish for nothing better," cried Perry, trying to kiss her hand.

We eat our feast at Rich

"Be quiet, sir, and listen to me. mond, and come back to live in this hole: I, with hardly a decent gown to my back ; you, with one coat off and one on, and both out at elbows (I've mended them many a time,—so there's no denying the fact). For a little while it would be all very well. And I do not say that we should come to a cat and dog life at all, but I think we should be wretched; you do not look into the future as I do, and see little clouds and big clouds and monstrous clouds rising out of the distance to break over our unfortunate heads. There would be dirt, debt, and dejection; in time, ill-temper, and a hundred thousand ignoble little stinging troubles. I don't think you will ever make a great fortune "—Kitty said this rather sadly-" though you are a genius, my poor Perry; but genius without good sense is like a gold coin you can't get change for. I have good sense and no genius, but I know you would never be guided by me." Here Perry tried to interrupt her, but she continued, "Now I will tell you my ideal of married life. Don't look alarmed. I don't crave anything extravagant. I only crave respectability. I want a little semi-detached house to ourselves in Kensington, and two or three neat maids, and a little plate, and a little

wine-cellar well filled, and a new silk dress once or twice ayear. Is that a dream of Utopia?"

"It's a dream of six hundred a year," said Perry, his hands in his pockets, and his face very gloomy.

"Well, if a man hasn't stuff in him worth six hundred a year, he's not the person to suit me," said Miss Silver, firmly; then, with an appearance of yielding a little, she added, "Perry, life is short; why not enjoy it?"

"That's just what I think. Hang it, Kitty, let's send care to the dogs, and marry to-morrow. I'm sure we shall be happy."

But Kitty stuck to the letter of her text, and he could not move her by a hair's breadth. It was impossible for two people to love each other and be happy upon less than six hundred a year.

CHAPTER II.

THE JOYS AND SORROWS OF ARTISTIC BOHEMIA.

KITTY was, in truth, growing tired of Bohemia. She had been born in it, and reared in it; she had eaten "its paper, and drunk its ink;" she had only at rare intervals overstepped its boundary line; but she no longer loved it. Those occasional wanderings into the kingdom of gentility had not been without effect, and, like the ambitious child of a vagabond mother, she now turned upon the hands that had fed her and taught her to walk.

But to get out of Bohemia into the kingdom of gentility, was the difficult point. Here she was as welcome as the flowers in May to everybody's crust and everybody's chimneycorner; she had a dozen lovers, a dozen adopted fathers and mothers, a dozen bosom friends. There, she knew that she would be a scapegoat and a stranger, having to pay for bare board and bread and water by some labour of her hands. What knight would pay court to her? What men and women would love her as their own child? What ladies would con

descend to become her friends in the country she thirsted for, as Christian for the Delectable Mountains? Poor Kitty! she looked into her glass, ready to smite her own portrait.

"What good does it do one to be handsome here or anywhere if one is poor? Amongst our people Polly Cornford is liked as well as I, and she is by no means beautiful. If I donned respectability, and went out as a governess, who would do me a good turn for having a face fit for a queen? What a pity there isn't a massacre of the Innocents in Bohemia once in a while-I mean of the girls-for then I should never have known what it is to be a woman and hate it ;" and Kitty would sit down, biting a long curl of her dark hair viciously, and think.

She had no visible kith nor kin, but her genealogy was good, and shone quite splendidly when occasion required, that is to say, outside Bohemia. Her family came in with the Conquerer, a position which no one feels able to dispute; one ancestor had fallen on Flodden Field, and that, too, would be an incontestable fact to most people. Her great-grandfather, Sir Hugh Silver, had been disinherited by an unjust father, had died a beggar, and the family estates had passed into other hands, in default of male heirs. Was there any reason why there should not have been a Sir Hugh Silver, and why Sir Hugh Silver should not have been Kitty's great-grandfather, and why Sir Hugh Silver should not have been disinherited by an unjust father, and why the family estates had not passed into other hands, in default of male heirs? None in the world; and if we do not sometimes blow our little trumpets, who will blow them for us? Kitty's genealogy was her ewe-lamb of a triumph, and she hugged it and kept it warm, and would not have forsaken it for worlds.

As in Bohemia Proper, that is to say, Gypsydom, one pays no taxes, so in Bohemia Moral one enjoys many unqualified exemptions. Propriety costs other things as well as money. The respectable man has to pay for the defalcations of his kindred. If his brother forges a bill, he is not thought fit for decent society. If his father fails dishonourably, who will

look upon him as a man to be trusted? The respectable woman pays four-fold for the sins of her blood. Who would not rather die than be the daughter of an unfaithful wife, or the wife of an unlucky man, or, worse still, the mother of a vicious son? Putting the secret shame out of the question, how sorely are the teeth of respectable people set on edge because their fathers have eaten sour grapes!

And how dearly do we pay for such crimes as a lean look, a shabby coat, an empty purse! If we have well-filled winecellars and butteries at home, we are teased to dine out every day; if we wear shining cloth and rustling silks, there is not a tailor or a milliner who would not rejoice to trust us; if we are supposed to be well off, what so easy as to borrow money? In Bohemia there is no injustice of this sort. If your friends fall into ill-luck or evil ways, it is none the worse for you-a little the better, since kind deeds are showered upon your head as if you were a bride or a hero. Show the hole in your coat, and some one will take off his own and clothe you in it. The last crust of bread will be brought out to you; the last sixpence will be shared with you.

A man is always a brother; a woman always a sister in Bohemia.

Kitty knew all this, and it gave her matter for serious thought. It did her no harm to be poor and friendless here; but how would it be in the great respectable world beyond? She pondered and pondered, and came to no conclusions. One moment she said to herself, "How dull it would be out there; no merry supper parties; no vagabond trips to Paris; no cafés chantant; no shrimp teas at Greenwich, but instead, sermons twice every Sunday, and so on;-how dull it would be!" Another moment and it was, "But I'm sure I'm not fond enough of Perry to live with him in Mrs Cornford's two-pair back. Oh dear! oh dear! if Perry's brains or mine were only worth six hundred a year!"

She had already tried various manoeuvres to serve two masters, to obtain a footing in the land of respectability without forfeiting her usufruct in Bohemia; but that would not

do. She found disloyalty to be the only unpardonable sin amongst her people, and abandoned it, seeing that, as yet, no other people welcomed her. Happy mediums are unknown theories to your true Bohemians, which is but natural. Bohemia itself is the very creation and expression of extravagance, and by extravagance alone does her kingdom stand.

In this stage of her career it occurred to Kitty to make the acquaintance of Mrs Cornford's pupils; but at present nothing had come of them. There was one handsome girl, a Miss Beckford, whose father was a rich hog's-bristle merchant, living at Wandsworth, of whom Miss Silver at one time entertained hopes. Julia Beckford was a fast young lady, and wanted to get into Bohemia fully as much as Kitty wanted to get out. The friendship of the two girls grew up

like a mushroom.

Miss Julia met Kitty, Perry, and one of Perry's friends one evening, sub rosa, and went to one of the small theatres. Miss Julia confided to Kitty that she would elope with Perry's friend any moment. Kitty was invited to Wandsworth, when all at once, no one could tell how it happened, Miss Julia was sent off to Brussels with a frigid aunt, and Bohemia knew her no more. There was another young lady of the poetic, phlegmatic kind, who adored Kitty at first sight, and showed her adoration in a hundred acceptable ways, giving her ribbons, gloves, chocolate, and knick-knacks.

This girl had not the faintest notion of what Bohemia meant, but she lived in a dull, methodistical atmosphere at home, and the little unconventionalities of Paradise Place delighted her. So simple was she, that Mrs Cornford would correct her drawing, cigarette in mouth,and would allow Perry to come into the studio for anything he wanted, when, of course, the young man would stop for a little enthusiastic talk with the ladies, and would recite verses from Byron or Shelley, which he did excellently; or play an air of Schubert's on the piano, which he did better still. There is nothing so intoxicating as enthusiasm to a sensitive, incapable nature; and it was quite