called, long before the title was his in reality, had found occasion to return abroad for scientific purposes. But, as a rule, it was to be met with every day, either pacing thoughtfully beside the wide sea, or passing rapidly across the green waste behind the straggling village, on the way to the mountains beyond.
The years went by. Professor Morgan became a shining light in the world of archæological science; but each year as it passed seemed to bind him down more and more irrevocably to solitude of heart. The shunning of all companionship, which at first had been but the instinct of a wounded and sensitive spirit, became at length a fixed habit, which he was too shy and reserved to break through. Each year increased the stoop of the Professor's shoulders, the baldness of his head, and the terrific development of his forehead. Each year the sad, shy eyes grew sadder and shyer, and were more and more rarely lifted to meet the undiscerning, unperceptive eyes of others. Little did anyone divine what bitter hours of heart loneliness the misanthropic, unsocial Professor passed in the grim, museum-like study of his lonely house, or what painful thoughts, quite unconnected with barrows and cromlechs and Druid circles, were his daily companions.
One August day the Professor made a journey miles away among the mountains for the purpose of taking fresh observations of a famous cromlech. He had been for two years at work upon a history of cromlechs, and was at this time gathering material for a chapter on the differences between British cromlechs and those of the nations of Germanic descent. The journey took him all the morning, and when he came within sight of the village on his return the afternoon sun was blazing at its hottest. About a mile and a half from the village the road passed through a rough field, in the midst of which, on a slight elevation, stood the ruins of an ancient British house. To any but an antiquary the house had the appearance of being nothing more than a shapeless heap of stones. The Professor had a theory of his own concerning its origin and history; and intended one day writing a magazine article about it by way of recreation from his laborious and exhaustive work on the cromlechs.
"Two tiny figures in black dresses."
As he drew near the ruin to-day he saw coming towards it, from the direction of the village, in the hot glare of the sun, two tiny figures in black dresses and white sunbonnets. Between them they bore a hamper, from which a yellow cat raised its head and gazed around with inquiring eyes. The little faces beneath the sun-bonnets were crimson with heat and haste, and, as
