of an observer of natural history, who sees a new species developing before him.  At all the best possible points he interposed suggestive questions, and set up objections in the quietest manner for the Doctor to knock down, smiling ever the while as a man may who truly and genuinely does not care a sou for truth on any subject not practically connected with his own schemes in life.  He therefore gently guided the Doctor to sail down the stream of his own thoughts till his bark glided out into the smooth waters of the Millennium, on which, with great simplicity, he gave his views at length.

It was just in the midst of this that Mary and her mother entered.  Burr interrupted the conversation to pay them the compliments of the morning,—­to inquire for their health, and hope they suffered no inconvenience from their night-ride from the party; then, seeing the Doctor still looking eager to go on, he contrived with gentle dexterity to tie again the broken thread of conversation.

“Our excellent friend,” he said, “was explaining to me his views of a future Millennium.  I assure you, ladies, that we sometimes find ourselves in company which enables us to believe in the perfectibility of the human species.  We see family retreats, so unaffected, so charming in their simplicity, where industry and piety so go hand in hand!  One has only to suppose all families such, to imagine a Millennium.”

There was no disclaiming this compliment, because so delicately worded, that, while perfectly clear to the internal sense, it was, in a manner, veiled and unspoken.

Meanwhile, the Doctor, who sat ready to begin where he left off, turned to his complaisant listener and resumed an exposition of the Apocalypse.

“To my mind, it is certain,” he said, “as it is now three hundred years since the fifth vial was poured out, there is good reason to suppose that the sixth vial began to be poured out at the beginning of the last century, and has been running for a hundred years or more, so that it is run nearly out; the seventh and last vial will begin to run early in the next century.”

“You anticipate, then, no rest for the world for some time to come?” said Burr.

“Certainly not,” said the Doctor, definitively; “there will be no rest from overturnings till He whose right it is shall come.

“The passage,” he added, “concerning the drying up of the river Euphrates, under the sixth vial, has a distinct reference, I think, to the account in ancient writers of the taking of Babylon, and prefigures, in like manner, that the resources of that modern Babylon, the Popish power, shall continue to be drained off, as they have now been drying up for a century or more, till, at last, there will come a sudden and final downfall of that power.  And after that will come the first triumphs of truth and righteousness,—­the marriage-supper of the Lamb.”

“These investigations must undoubtedly possess a deep interest for you, Sir,” said Burr; “the hope of a future as well as the tradition of a past age of gold seems to have been one of the most cherished conceptions of the human breast.”