How intensely I wish he were worthy of all this care! Last night as I sat beside him, with his head in my lap, passing my fingers through his beautiful curls, this thought made my eyes overflow with sorrowful tears--as it often does,--but this time, a tear fell on his face and made him look up. He smiled, but not insultingly.

`Dear Helen!' he said--`why do you cry? you know that I love you (and he pressed my hand to his feverish lips), `and what more could you desire?'

`Only, Arthur, that you would love yourself, as truly and as faithfully as you are loved by me.'

`That would be hard indeed!' he replied, tenderly squeezing my hand,

I don't know whether he fully understood my meaning, but he smiled--thoughtfully and even sadly--a most unusual thing with him;--and then he closed his eyes and fell asleep, looking as careless and sinless as a child. As I watched that placid slumber, my heart swelled fuller than ever, and my tears flowed unrestrained.

August 24. Arthur is himself again, as lusty and reckless, as light of heart and head as ever, and as restless and hard to amuse as a spoilt child,--and almost as full of mischief too, especially when wet weather keeps him within doors. I wish he had some thing to do, some useful trade, or profession, or employment--anything to occupy his head or his hands for a few hours a day, and give him something besides his own pleasure to think about, If he would play the country gentleman, and attend to the farm-- but that he knows nothing about, and won't give his mind to consider,--or if he would take up with some literary study, or learn to draw or to play--as he is so fond of music, I often try to persuade him to learn the piano, but he is far too idle for such an undertaking: he has no more idea of exerting himself to overcome obstacles than he has of restraining his natural appetites; and these two things are the ruin of him. I lay them both to the charge of his harsh yet careless father and his madly indulgent mother. If ever I am a mother I will zealously strive against this crime of over-indulgence--I can hardly give it a milder name when I think of the evils it brings.

Happily, it will soon be the shooting season, and then, if the weather permit, he will find occupation enough in the pursuit and destruction of the partridges and pheasants: we have no grouse, or he might have been similarly occupied at this moment, instead of lying under the acacia tree pulling poor Dash's ears. But he says it is dull work shooting alone; he must have a friend or two to help him.

`Let them be tolerably decent then, Arthur,' said I--The word `friend,' in his mouth, makes me shudder: I know it was some of his `friends' that induced him to stay behind me in London, and kept him away so long--indeed, from what he has unguardedly told me, or hinted from time to time, I cannot doubt that he frequently showed them my letters, to let them see how fondly his wife watched over his interests and how keenly she regretted his absence; and that they induced him to remain week after week, and to plunge into all manner of excesses to avoid being laughed at for a wife-ridden fool, and, perhaps, to show how far he could venture to go without danger of shaking the fond creature's devoted attachment. It is a hateful idea, but I cannot believe it is a false one.

`Well,' replied he, `I thought of Lord Lowborough for one; but there is no possibility of getting him without his better half, our mutual friend Annabella; so we must ask them both. You're not afraid of her, are you, Helen?' he asked, with a mischievous twinkle in his eyes.

`Of course not,' I answered: `why should I?--And who besides?'

`Hargrave for one--he will be glad to come, though his own place is so near, for he has little enough land of his own to shoot over, and we can extend our depredations into it, if we like;--and he is thoroughly respectable, you know, Helen, quite a lady's man:--and I think, Grimsby for another: he's a decent, quiet fellow enough--you'll not object to Grimsby?'