an order which marked him in any assembly.  ’Twas not only that his features were of so fine a moulding, that his thick hair curled about his brow in splendid rings, and that he had a large deep eye, tawny brown and fearless as a young lion’s, but there was in the carriage of his head, the bearing of his body, the very movement of his limbs a thing which stamped him.  In truth, it was as if nature, in a lavish mood and having leisure, had built a human creature of her best and launched him furnished forth with her fairest fortunes, that she might behold what he would do.  The first time he was taken by his parents to London, there was a day upon which, while walking in the garden of Hampton Court, accompanied by his governor, he found himself stopped by a splendid haughty lady, whom Mr. Fox saluted with some fearfulness when she addressed him.  She asked the boy’s name, and, putting her hand on his shoulder, so held him that she might look at him well.

“The little Roxholm,” she said.  “Yes, his mother was the beauty who—­”

’Twas as if she checked her speech.  She made a quick, imperious movement with her head, and added:  “He is all rumour said of him;” and she turned away with such abruptness that the child asked himself how he had vexed her, and wondered also at her manners, he being used only to grace and courtesy.

They were near the end of the terrace which looked upon the River Thames, and she went with her companion and leaned upon the stone balustrades, looking out upon the water with fierce eyes.  “The woman who could give him a son like that,” she said, “could hold him against all others, and demand what she chose.  Squat Catherine herself could do it.”

Little Roxholm heard her.

“She is a very handsome lady,” he said, innocently, “though she has a strange way.  Is she of the Court, and do you know her name?”

“’Tis her Grace the Duchess of Cleveland,” answered Mr. Fox, gravely, as they walked away.

He was seven years old at this time, and ’twas during this visit to town that he heard a conversation which made a great impression upon him, opening up as it did new vistas of childish thinking.  Having known but one phase of existence, he was not aware that he had lived the life of a young prince in a fairy tale, and that there were other children whose surroundings were as gloomy as his were fair and bright.

He was one day comfortably ensconced in the deep embrasure of a window, a book upon his knee, when Mistress Halsell and one of the upper servants came into the room upon which his study opened, and presently his ear was attracted by a thing they were speaking of with some feeling.

“As sweetly pretty a young lady as ever one beheld,” he heard.  “Never saw I a fairer skin or eyes more hyacinth-blue—­and her hair trailing to the ground like a mantle, and as soft and fine as silk.”

’Twas this which made him stop in his reading.  The description seeming so like that of a beauty in a story of chivalry in which knights fought for such loveliness.