bright as sunshine, and so like his dear mother!
I wept, and he laughed, and we were both too
happy. My eyes feasted ou his radiant face;
and then to hear him saying, in his young
voice:

"Sister Anne"—he always called me so—
"you are prettier than ever!" Or, again,
"Sister Anne, when will you leave this merry
cottage and go back to the old house?"

"When you are a rich man, my darling," I
replied, gaily.

I thought nothing of that speech of his then;
I only thought that I had him back, that Mr.
Gibson was coming, and that my cup of happiness
was very nearly full; but when, the next
day, William said to me, almost gravely, "So
the old house is to let?" I began to wonder
that he thought so much about it. I asked if
he had seen it.

"Yes, I went round that way. It is a noble
place, sister Anne. The gate was shut, but I
could see the fountain. It was not playing."

"My darling," I said, with a little sigh—
for when he spoke of the fountain the memory
of many lost and happy hours came back to
me—" we must not think of that now. You
are to be a civil engineer, please Heaven, and
civil engineers don't live in Elizabethan
mansions, as a rule."

"Then I'll be an exception," he said, walking
about my little parlour with his hands in his
pockets, laughing so joyously that it made my
heart glad within me to hear him.

But, alas! my gladness was all gone the next
morning; for my poor boy was in a burning
fever. Three weeks of suspense and misery
followed; then he was saved, said the doctor;
but, oh! how weak and languid, how pale and
worn and altered! He had the strangest
fancies. Nothing would do for him one day but
to send me off to W. for some particular
lozenges. I wanted the servant to go, but he
grew pettish and fretful; she was stupid, and
would commit some mistake, he said; I must
go myself; and so, to please him, I went.

W. is two miles away from Rosebower, but I
walked fast, and soon reached it. I despatched
my errand quickly, and made haste home. I
felt all eagerness to return, for, to say the
truth, William Gibson had arrived that morning,
and I feared he would call whilst I was
out. To miss seeing him, even one day, seemed
hard after so long a separation. My way home
was up-hill, and I walked so swiftly that I was
soon breathless. I was obliged to sit down by
a stile and rest for a few minutes. A strong
high hedge divided the broad field I had been
crossing from the next. Along that hedge
there ran a low path, which had been well known
to dear Miss Graeme and me in days gone by.
I was thinking of her when I heard Ellen's
voice close to me. I looked, but, though I
could not see her, my heart beat fast; for I
guessed to whom she was speaking. I was so
moved that I could not stir; I could not even
speak; I could only sit there, lost in a joy which
soon passed away.

"I tell you she does not care about you, and
never will," pettishly said Ellen. " I wonder
you will think of her."

"I suppose I cannot help it," answered
William Gibson's voice, rather sadly.

"She is so wrapped up in her brother that
it makes me sick," continued Ellen.

"Have you seen him?"

"No; but I hate him, big stupid boy!
What right has she to praise him so, and then
throw it in my face that you are awkward, that
you don't know how to sit on a chair, and that
you tread on ladies' dresses?"

I heard Ellen, and felt petrified with anger
and amazement. I started to my feet to
contradict and deny, but they had already passed
on. "No matter," I thought, as I too rose
and walked away; " Mr. Gibson shall know the
truth, Ellen. He shall know that the words
you have so cruelly remembered and repeated
to him were uttered eight years back when we
were all children. He shall know it, though
Heaven knows what he will think of me for
volunteering such a confession!"

' I could have cried with shame at the thought,
and yet I was quite determined. No pride, no
reserve should prevent me from undeceiving
William Gibson. He should not think, no
matter what the cost might be, that I slighted
him because he was nervous and shy. I do not
know how I should have done this, but I never had
the opportunity. When I got home I found my
poor boy once more very ill; he had a relapse that
lasted weeks; and during all that time I never
left him night or day. At length he got well
again, and on a lovely morning in April I could
take him down to the garden. He sat in an
arm-chair, in the sun, looking at the early
flowers, at the green hedge, at a broad field in
which a cow was grazing, at the blue sky, along
which little fleecy clouds sailed away; and he
looked so like his dear mother that my whole
heart yearned towards him.

"God bless you, my darling!" I could not
help saying—" God bless you!"

He smiled, and was going to say something,
when the garden-gate opened; two dark figures
stepped between us and the sun, and, looking
up, I saw Ellen and her brother coming towards
us. As I saw them then, I see them still as I
write. She, a tall, elegant, and beautiful girl of
nineteen, with long golden curls and the freshness
of a rose; he, pale, nervous, and much
altered. Was that her doing? Had that
lovely but very selfish sister improved her
opportunity all this time, and stabbed him day
after day with those little thrusts of unkind
speech which can wound so deeply? She did
not like me, that I had always known; but
might she not have spared him? I suppose
she did not wish him to marry. The sin sat
very lightly on her conscience, however; for
she came towards us with a happy smile on her
rosy lips, and her charming face full of pretty
dimples.

"Give William a good scolding, Miss Sydney,"
she said, gaily; " he wanted to go away