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IDALIA

it for money. Ah! how much have you got of it left?"

"But little—only a dozen or so, I believe; but of what there is I would ask the pleasure of your Grace's acceptance, if the wine find favour with you."

"Favour with me? Hear the man. Why, it's Leopold's own growth, I tell you," cried his Grace.

"As for giving it away, thank you a thousand times, but I couldn't—I wouldn't rob you of it for anything."

"Indeed I beg you will, my dear Duke," said Erceldoune, with a slight smile. "To a rich man you may refuse what you like, but to a poor man you mast leave the pleasure of giving when he can."

"Really, on my soul, you're very good," said the Duke, whose heart was longing after the imperial vintage. "I thank you heartily, my dear fellow; but you're too generous, Erceldoune; give your head away, like all your race!—like all your race! If your ancestors had had their hands a little less free at giving, and their heads a little longer at their expenditure, you wouldn't have this place all tumbledown as it is about you now!"

"Generosity, if I can ever make claim to it, will not imperil me. Who has nothing can lose