The erudite churchman, after a very abrupt notice of the company, started at speed without losing a moment.
His attention being caught by some curious tableaux of the interior of the great Pyramid, he immediately commenced an explanation of the various figures, the costumes and weapons, which he said were all masonic, showing that Pharaoh wore an apron exactly like the Duke of Sussex, and that every emblem of the “arch” was to be found among the great of Ancient Egypt.
While thus employed, Mr. Howie, seated in a corner, was busily sketching the whole party for an illustration to his new book on Ireland, and once more Cashel and his companion found themselves, of course by the merest accident, standing opposite the same picture in a little boudoir off the large gallery. The subject was a scene from Faust, where Marguerite, leaning on her lover's arm, is walking in a garden by moonlight, and seeking by a mode of divination common in Germany to ascertain his truth, which is by plucking one by one the petals of a flower, saying alternately, “He loves me, he loves me not;” and then, by the result of the last-plucked leaf, deciding which fate is accomplished. Cashel first explained the meaning of the trial, and then taking a rose from one of the flower vases, he said,—
“Let me see if you can understand my teaching; you have only to say, 'Er liebt mich,' and, 'Er liebt mich nicht.'”
“But how can I?” said she, with a look of beaming innocence, “if there be none who—”
“No matter,” said Cashel; “besides, is it not possible you could be loved, and yet never know it? Now for the ordeal.”
“Er liebt mich nicht,” said Olivia, with a low, silvery voice, as she plucked the first petal off, and threw it on the floor.
“You begin inauspiciously, and, I must say, unfairly, too,” said Cashel. “The first augury is in favor of love.”
“Er liebt mich,” said she, tremulously, and the leaf broke in her fingers. “Ha!” sighed she, “what does that imply? Is it, that he only loves by half his heart?”