beyond the brow, and said to herself that this
Miss Pickard was the most wilful young lady
she had ever known, but that she could not
help liking her, too. She did not seem to
value her life any more than a pin; and yet
she appeared altogether cheerful and sensible.
If the good woman had been able to see into
Mary's heart, she would have discovered that
she had the best reason in the world for
valuing life very much indeed: but she had
been so accustomed, all her life, to help                                                              everybody that needed it, that she naturally                                                       went straight forward into the business,                                                              without looking at difficulties or dangers, on                                                       the right hand or the left.

Mary never, while she lived, forgot this
drive. Her tone of mind was, no doubt, high,
though she was unconscious of it. It was a
splendid August evening, and she had never
before seen moorland. In America, she had
travelled among noble inland forests, and a
hard granite region near the coasts of New
England: but the wide-spreading brown and
green moorland, with its pools of clear brown
water glittering in the evening sunshine, and
its black cocks popping out of the heather,
and running into the hollows, was quite new
to her. She looked down, two or three times,
into a wooded dell where grey cottages were
scattered among the coppices, and a little
church tower rose above them; but the
swelling ridges of the moor, with the tarns
between, immediately attracted her eye again.

"Surely," thought she, " the cordon will let
me walk on the moor in the afternoons, if I
go where I cannot infect any body. With a
walk in such places as these every day, I am
sure I could go through any thing."

This seemed very rational beforehand. It
never entered Mary's head that for a long
while to come, she should never once have
leisure for a walk.

"Yon's the cordon," said the post-boy, at
last, pointing with his whip.

"What do you understand by a cordon?"

"Them people that you may see there. I
don't know why they call them so; for I
don't hear that they do anything with a cord."

"Perhaps it is because there is a French
word— cordon -- that means any thing that
encloses any other thing. They would call
your hat band a cordon, and an officer's sash,
and a belt of trees round a park. So, I
suppose these people surround poor Bleaburn
and let nobody out."

"May be so," said the man, " but I don't see
why we should go to the French for our
words or anything else, when we have
everything better of our own. For my part, I
shall be beholden to the French for no word,
now I know of it. I shall call them people
the watch, or something of that like."

"I think I will call them messengers," said
Mary: " and that will sound least terrible to
the people below. They do go on errands, do
not they,—and take and send parcels and
messages?"

"They are paid to do it, Miss: but they
put it upon one another, or get out of the
way, if they can,—they are so afraid of the
fever, you see— I think we must stop here,
please, Miss. I could go a little nearer, only,
you see—."

"I see that you are afraid of the fever too,"
said Mary, with a smile, as she jumped out
upon the grass. One of the sentinels was
within hail. Glad of the relief from the
dulness of his watch, he came with alacrity,
took charge of the little trunk, and offered to
show the lady, from the brow, the way down
the hollow to the village.

The post-boy stood, with his money in his
hand, watching the retreating lady, till, under
a sudden impulse, he hailed her. Looking
round, she saw him running towards her,
casting a momentary glance back at his horses.
He wanted to try once more to persuade her
to return to O— . He should be so happy
to drive her back, out of the way of danger.
His employer would be so glad to see her
again! When he perceived that it was no
use talking, he went on touching his hat, while
he begged her to take back the shilling she
had just given him. It would make his mind
easier, he said, not to take money for bringing
any lady to such a place. Mary saw that this
was true; and she took back the shilling,
promising that it should be spent in the service
of some poor sick person.

As Mary descended into the hollow, she
was struck with the quiet beauty of the scene.
The last sun-blaze rushed level along the upper
part of the cleft, while the lower part lay in
deep shadow. While she was descending a
steep slope, with sometimes grass, and                                                                        sometimes grey rock, by the roadside, the                                                             opposite height rose precipitous; and from                                                                     chinks in its brow, little drips of water fell or                                                                   oozed down, calling into life ferns, and grass,                                                               and ivy, in every moist crevice. Near the top,
there were rows of swallow-holes; and the
birds were at this moment all at play in the
last glow of the summer day, now dipping
into the shaded dell, down to the very                                                                            surface of the water, and then sprinkling the
grey precipice with their darting shadows.
Below, when Mary reached the bridge, she
thought all looked shadowy in more senses
than one. The first people she saw were some
children, excessively dirty, who were paddling
about in a shallow pool, which was now none
of the sweetest, having been filled by the
spring overflow, and gradually drying up ever
since. Mary called to these children from
the bridge, to ask where Widow Johnson lived.
She could learn nothing more than that she
must proceed; for, if the creatures had not
been almost too boorish to speak, she could
have made nothing of the Yorkshire dialect,
on the first encounter. In the narrow street,
every window seemed closed, and even the
shutters of some. She could see nobody in
the first two or three shops that she passed;
but, at the baker's, a woman was sitting at