Mrs. and Miss are to be home to-day; they wrote
to cook this morning. I shall be there to-morrow,
sartain, and I'll ask in the kitchen when Master
Edward is a coming back."

Alfred saw he had fallen into the right hands;
here was a good soul who only wanted starting
to give many answers to few questions. He
reflected a moment, then asked her could she
bring him two fresh eggs every morning?

"Who better?" said she. " Why, we do lay
our own: only they come a little dearer than the
shop eggs; but la! a halfpenny's not much to
the likes of you."

"Good things are never cheap," said the sly
boy; " so if you will be upon honour that they
are yours, and fresh, I'll stand sixpence for two
every morning."

"Sixpence for a couple of eggs!" cried Mrs.
Maxley, flushing all over with desire of gain. " I
durstn't do it; Jem he'd kill me."

"Nonsense! It is not for the eggs only, but
your trouble in bringing them: why, it is half a
mile."

"So 'tis. La! to think of a young gentleman
like you vallying a poor woman's time; and you
got nothing to do with yourn, but fling it away
on cricketing and larning, which they don't make
nobody rich, they don't."

Love and Avarice soon struck a bargain, and
for once the nobler passion became as early a bird
as the other, and picked up many a good crumb of
intelligence. The ladies of Albion Villa were good
kind ladies; the very maid-servants loved them;
Miss was more-for religion than her mother, and
went to St. Anne's church Thursday evenings,
and Sundays morning and evening; and visited
some poor women in the parish with food and
clothes; Mrs. Dodd could not sleep a wink
when the wind blew hard at night; but never
complained, only came down pale to breakfast.
Miss Julia's ailment was nothing to speak of,
but they were in care along of being so wrapt up
in her, and no wonder, for if ever there was a
duck——

Acting on this intelligence, Alfred went early
the next Sunday to St. Anne's church, and sat
down in the side gallery at its east end. While
the congregation flowed quietly in, the organist
played the Agnus Dei of Mozart. Those pious
tender tones stole over this hot young heart, and
whispered, " Peace! be still!" He sighed
wearily, and it passed through his mind that it
might have been better for him, and especially for
his studies, if he had never seen her. Such
instincts are often prophetic. Suddenly the aisle
seemed to lighten up; she was gliding along it,
beautiful as May, and modesty itself in dress and
carriage. She went into a pew and kneeled a
minute, then seated herself and looked out the
lessons for the day. Alfred gazed at her face;
devoured it. But her eyes never roved. She
seemed to have put off feminine curiosity, and
the world, at the church door. Indeed, he wished
she was not quite so heavenly discreet; her
lashes were delicious, but he longed to see her
eyes once more; to catch a glance from them,
and, by it, decipher his fate.

But, no; she was there to worship, and did
not discern her earthly lover, whose longing
looks were glued to her, and his body rose and
sank with the true worshippers, but with no more
spirituality than a piston, or a Jack-in-the-box.

In the last hymn, before the sermon, a well-
meaning worshipper in the gallery delivered a
leading note, a high one, with great zeal, but
small precision, being about a semitone flat; at
this outrage on her too sensitive ear Julia Dodd
turned her head swiftly to discover the offender;
and failed; but her two sapphire eyes met
Alfred's point-blank.

She was crimson in a moment, and lowered
them on her book again, as if to look that way
was to sin. It was but a flash: but sometimes a
flash fires a mine.

The lovely blush deepened and spread before
it melted away, and Alfred's late cooling heart
warmed itself at that sweet glowing cheek. She
never looked his way again, not once: which
was a sad disappointment; but she blushed again
and again before the service ended, only not so
deeply: now, there was nothing in the sermon
to make her blush. I might add, there was
nothing to redden her cheek with religious
excitement. There was a little candid sourness—
oil and vinegar—against sects and low church-
men; but thin generality predominated. Total:
"Acetate of morphia," for dry souls to sip.

So Alfred took all the credit of causing those
sweet irrelevant blushes; and gloated: the
young wretch could not help glorying in his
power to tint that fair statue of devotion with
earthly thoughts.

But stay! that dear blush, was it pleasure or
pain? What if the sight of him was intolerable?

He would know how he stood with her, and
on the spot. He was one of the first to leave the
church; he made for the churchyard gate, and
walked slowly backwards and forwards by it,
with throbbing heart till she came out.

She was prepared for him now, and bowed
slightly to him with the most perfect composure,
and no legible sentiment, except a certain marked
politeness many of our young ladies think wasted
upon young gentlemen; and are mistaken.

Alfred took off his hat in a tremor, and his eyes
implored and inquired, but met with no further
response; and she walked swiftly home, though
without apparent effort. He looked longingly
after her; but discretion forbade.

He now crawled by Albion Villa twice every
day, wet or dry, and had the good fortune to see
her twice at the drawing-room window. He was
constant at St. Anne's church, and one Thursday
crept into the aisle to be nearer to her, and
he saw her steal one swift look at the gallery,
and look grave; but soon she detected him, and
though she looked no more towards him, she
seemed demurely complacent. Alfred had learned
to note these subtleties now, for Love is a microscope.
What he did not know was, that his timid