room, this time in a blue silk dressing-gown, embroidered with flowers of gold.

'What has come?' said Virginia, pettishly, for she was suffering from a terrible headache, and the Professor's loud voice annoyed her. 'You don't mean to say that we are rescued, are we?'

'Yes,' answered Paul, solemnly; 'we are rescued. We are rescued from all the pains and imperfections of a world that has not learnt how to conform to the laws of matter, and is but imperfectly acquainted with the science of sociology. It is therefore inevitable that, the evils of existence being thus removed, we shall both be solemnly, stupendously, and unspeakably happy.'

'Nonsense!' said Virginia, snappishly, who thought the Professor was joking.

'It is not nonsense,' said the Professor, 'It is deducible from the teachings of John Stuart Mill, of Auguste Comte, of Mr. Frederic Harrison, and of all the exact thinkers who have cast off superstition, and who adore Humanity.'

Virginia meanwhile ate paté de foie gras, of which she was passionately fond; and, growing a little less sullen, she at last admitted that they were lucky in having at least the necessaries of life left to them. 'But as for happiness—there is nothing to do here, there is no church to go to, and you don't seem to care a bit for my dressing-gown. What have we got to make us happy?'

'Humanity,' replied the Professor eagerly,—'Humanity, that divine entity, which is necessarily capable of everything that is fine and invaluable, and is the object of indescribable emotion to all exact thinkers. And what is Humanity?' he went on more earnestly; 'you and I are Humanity—you and I are that august existence. You already are all the world to me; and I very soon shall be all the world to you. Adored being, it will be my mission and my glory to compel you to live for me. And then, as modern philosophy can demonstrate, we shall both of us be significantly and unspeakably happy.'

For a few moments Virginia merely stared at Paul. Suddenly she turned quite pale, her lips quivered, and exclaiming, 'How dare you!—and I, too, the wife of a bishop!' she left the room in hysterics.

The Professor could make nothing of this. Though he had dissected many dead women, he knew very little of the hearts of live ones. A sense of shyness overpowered him, and he felt embarrassed, he could not tell why, at being thus left alone with Virginia. He lit a cigar and went out. Here was a to-do indeed, he thought. How would progress be possible if one half of Humanity misunderstood the other?

He was thus musing, when suddenly a voice startled him; and in another moment a man came rushing up to him, with every demonstration of joy.

'Oh, my dear master! oh, emancipator of the human intellect! and is it indeed you? Thank God!—--I beg pardon for my unspeakable blasphemy—I mean, thank circumstances over which I have no control.'

It was one of the three curates, whom Paul had supposed drowned, but who now related how he had managed to swim ashore, despite the extreme length of his black clerical coat. 'These rags of superstition,' he said, 'did their best to drown me. But I survive in spite of them, to covet truth and to reject error. Thanks to your glorious teaching,' he went on, looking reverentially into the Professor's face, 'the very notion of an Almighty Father makes me laugh consumedly, it is so absurd and so immoral. Science, through your instrumentality, has opened my eyes. I am now an exact thinker.'

'Do you believe, said Paul, 'in solemn, significant, and unspeakably happy Humanity?

'I do,' said the curate, fervently. 'Whenever I think of Humanity, I groan and moan to myself out of sheer solemnity.'

'Then two thirds of Humanity,' said the Professor, 'are thoroughly enlightened. Progress will now go on smoothly.'

At this moment Virginia came out, having rapidly recovered composure at the sound of a new man's voice.

'You here—you, too!' exclaimed the curate. 'How solemn, how significant! This is truly Providential——I mean this has truly happened through conformity to the laws of matter.'

'Well,' said Virginia, 'since we have a clergyman amongst us, we shall perhaps be able to get on.'

CHAPTER VII.

Things now took a better turn. The Professor ceased to feel shy; and proposed, when the curate had finished an enormous breakfast, that they should go down to the cutter, and bring up the things in it to the cottage. 'A few hours' steady progress,' he said, 'and the human race will command all the luxuries of civilisation—the glorious fruits of centuries of onward labour.'

The three spent a very busy morning in examining and unpacking the luggage. The Professor found his favourite collection of modern philosophers; Virginia found a large box of knick-knacks, with which to adorn the cottage; and there was, too, an immense store of wine and of choice provisions.

'It is rather sad,' sighed Virginia, as she dived into a box of French chocolate-creams, 'to think that all the poor people are drowned that these things belonged to.'

'They are not dead,' said the Professor: 'they still live on this holy and stupendous earth. They live in the use we are making of all they had got together. The owner of those chocolate-creams is immortal because you are eating them.'

Virginia licked her lips and said, 'Nonsense!'

'It is not nonsense,' said the Professor. 'It is the religion of Humanity.'

All day they were busy, and the time passed pleasantly enough. Wines, provisions, books, and china ornaments were carried up to the cottage and bestowed in proper places. Virginia filled the glasses in the drawing-room with gorgeous leaves and flowers and declared by the evening, as she looked round her, that she could almost fancy herself in St. John's Wood.

'See, said the Professor, 'how rapid is the progress of material civilisation! Humanity is now entering on the fruits of ages. Before long it will be in a position to be unspeakably happy.'

Virginia retired to bed early. The Professor took the curate out with him to look at the stars; and promised to lend him some writings of the modern philosophers, which would make him more perfect in the new view of things. They said good-night, murmuring together that there was certainly no God, that Humanity was very important, and that everything was very solemn.

CHAPTER VIII.

Next morning the curate began studying a number of essays that the Professor lent him, all written by exact thinkers, who disbelieved in God, and thought Humanity adorable, and most important. Virginia lay on the sofa, and sighed over one of Miss Broughton's novels; and it occurred to the Professor that the island was just the place where, if anywhere, the missing link might be found.

'Ah!' he exclaimed; 'all is still progress. Material progress came to an end yesterday. Mental progress has begun to-day. One third of Humanity is cultivating sentiment; another third is learning to covet truth. I, the remaining and most enlightened third, will go and seek it. Glorious, solemn Humanity! I will go and look about for its arboreal ancestor.'

Every step the Professor took he found the island more beautiful. But he came back to luncheon, having been unsuccessful in his search. Events had marched quickly in his absence. Virginia was at the beginning of her third volume; and the curate had skimmed over so many essays, that he professed himself able to give a thorough account of the want of faith that was in him.

After luncheon the three sat together in easy chairs, in the verandah, sometimes talking, sometimes falling into a half-doze. They all agreed that they were wonderfully comfortable, and the Professor said—

'All Humanity is now at rest, and in utter peace. It is just taking breath, before it becomes unspeakably and significantly happy.'

He would have said more, but he was here