had scarcely noticed before—received a name and an intimation of their properties. It appeared that she had minutely studied the botany of English fields and woods. Having reached the head of the ravine, they sat down together on a ledge of gray and mossy rock jutting from the base of a steep, green hill which towered above them; she looked round her, and spoke of the neighbourhood as she had once before seen it long ago. She alluded to its changes, and compared its aspect with that of other parts of England; revealing quiet, unconscious touches of description, a sense of the picturesque, an appreciation of the beautiful or commonplace, a power of comparing the wild with the cultured, the grand with the tame, that gave to her discourse a graphic charm as pleasant as it was unpretending.

The sort of reverent pleasure with which Caroline listened—so sincere, so quiet, yet so evident—stirred the elder lady’s faculties to gentle animation. Rarely, probably, had she, with her chill, repellent outside, her diffident mien and incommunicative habits, known what it was to excite in one whom she herself could love, feelings of earnest affection and admiring esteem. Delightful, doubtless, was the consciousness that a young girl, towards whom it seemed—judging by the moved expression of her eyes and features—her heart turned with almost a fond impulse, looked up to her as an instructor, and clung to her as a friend. With a somewhat more marked accent of interest than she often permitted herself to use, she said, as she bent towards her youthful companion, and put aside from her forehead a pale brown curl which had strayed from the confining comb:

‘I do hope this sweet air blowing from the hill will do you good, my dear Caroline; I wish I could see something more of colour in these cheeks, but perhaps you were never florid?’

‘I had red cheeks once,’ returned Miss Helstone, smiling. ‘I remember a year—two years ago—when I used to look in the glass, I saw a different face there to what I see now—rounder and rosier. But when we are young,’ added the girl of eighteen, ‘our minds are careless and our lives easy.’

‘Do you,’ continued Mrs. Pryor, mastering by an effort that tyrant timidity which made it difficult for her, even under present circumstances, to attempt the scrutiny of another’s heart—‘do you, at your age, fret yourself with cares for the future? Believe me, you had better not; let the morrow take thought for the things of itself.’

‘True, dear madam: it is not over the future I pine. The evil of the day is sometimes oppressive—too oppressive, and I long to escape it.’

‘That is—the evil of the day; that is—your uncle, perhaps, is not—you find it difficult to understand—he does not appreciate—’

Mrs. Pryor could not complete her broken sentence; she could not manage to put the question whether Mr. Helstone was too harsh with his niece, but Caroline comprehended.

‘Oh, that is nothing,’ she replied; ‘my uncle and I get on very well; we never quarrel—I don’t call him harsh—he never scolds me. Sometimes I wish somebody in the world loved me; but I cannot say that I particularly wish him to have more affection for me than he has. As a child, I should perhaps have felt the want of attention, only the servants were very kind to me; but when people are long indifferent to us, we grow indifferent to their indifference. It is my uncle’s way not to care for women and girls—unless they be ladies that he meets in company: he could not alter, and I have no wish that he should alter, as far as I am concerned. I believe it would merely annoy and frighten me were he to be affectionate towards me now. But you know, Mrs. Pryor, it is scarcely living to measure time as I do at the Rectory. The hours pass, and I get them over somehow, but I do not live. I endure existence, but I rarely enjoy it. Since Miss Keeldar and you came I have been—I was going to say, happier, but that would be untrue.’ She paused.

‘How untrue? You are fond of Miss Keeldar, are you not, my dear?’