Captain Lennox described at Corfu. The
very parts which made Margaret glow as she
listened, Edith pretended to shiver and
shudder at; partly for the pleasure she had in
being coaxed out of her dislike by her fond
lover, and partly because anything of a gipsy
or make-shift life was really distasteful to
her. Yet had any one come with a fine house
and a fine estate, and a title to boot, Edith
would still have clung to Captain Lennox
while the temptation lasted; when it was
over, it is possible she might have had little
qualms of ill-concealed regret that Captain
Lennox could not have united in his person
everything that was desirable. In this she
was but her mother's child; who, after
deliberately marrying General Shaw with no
warmer feeling than respect for his character
and establishment, was constantly, though
quietly, bemoaning her hard lot in being
united to one whom she could not love.

''I have spared no expense in her trousseau,"
were the next words Margaret heard.
"She has all the beautiful Indian shawls and
scarfs the General gave to me, but which I
shall never wear again."

"She is a lucky girl," replied another voice,
which Margaret knew to be that of Mrs.
Gibson, a lady who was taking a double
interest in the conversation, from the fact of
one of her daughters having been married ,
within the last few weeks. "Helen had set
her heart upon an Indian shawl, but really
when I found what an extravagant price was
asked, I was obliged to refuse her. She will
be quite envious when she hears of Edith
having Indian shawls. What kind are they?
Delhi? with the lovely little borders?"

Margaret heard her aunt's voice again, but
this time it was as if she had raised herself up
from her half-recumbent position, and were
looking into the more dimly lighted back
drawing-room. "Edith! Edith!" cried she;
and then she sank back as if wearied by the
exertion. Margaret stepped forward.

"Edith is asleep, Aunt Shaw. Is it
anything I can do?"

All the ladies said " Poor child!" on
receiving this distressing intelligence about
Edith; and the minute lap-dog in Mrs.
Shaw's arms began to bark, as if excited by
the burst of pity.

"Hush, Tiny! you naughty little girl! you
will waken your mistress. It was only to ask
Edith if she would tell Newton to bring
down her shawls: perhaps you would go,
Margaret dear?"

Margaret went up into the old nursery at
the very top of the house, where Newton was
busy getting up some laces which were
required for the wedding. While Newton went
(not without a muttered grumbling) to undo
the shawls, which had already been exhibited
four or five times that day, Margaret looked
round upon the nursery; the first room in
that house with which she had become
familiar nine years ago, when she was brought,
all untamed from the forest, to share the
home, the play, and the lessons of her cousin
Edith. She remembered the dark, dim look
of the London nursery, presided over by an
austere and ceremonious nurse, who was
terribly particular about clean hands and torn
frocks. She recollected the first tea up
there—separate from her father and aunt,
who were dining somewhere down below an
infinite depth of stairs; for unless she were
up in the sky (the child thought), they must
be deep down in the bowels of the earth.
At home—before she came to live in Harley
Street—her mother's dressing-room had been
her nursery; and, as they kept early hours
in the country parsonage, Margaret had
always had her meals with her father and
mother. Oh! well did the tall, stately girl
of eighteen remember the tears shed with
such wild passion of grief by the little girl
of nine, as she hid her face under the
bedclothes, in that first night; and how she was
bidden not to cry by the nurse, because it
would disturb Miss Edith; and how she had
cried as bitterly, but more quietly, till her
newly-seen grand pretty aunt had come softly
upstairs with Mr. Hale to show him his little
sleeping daughter. Then the little Margaret
had hushed her sobs, and tried to lie quiet as
if asleep, for fear of making her father
unhappy by her grief, which she dared not
express before her aunt, and which she rather
thought it was wrong to feel at all after the
long hoping, and planning, and contriving
they had gone through at home, before her
wardrobe could be arranged so as to suit her
grander circumstances, and before papa could
leave his parish to come up to London, even
for a few days.

Now she had got to love the old nursery,
though it was but a dismantled place; and she
looked all round, with a kind of cat-like
regret, at the idea of leaving it for ever in three
days.

"Ah Newton!" said she, " I think we
shall all be sorry to leave this dear old
room."

"Indeed, miss, I shan't, for one. My eyes
are not so good as they were, and the light
here is so bad that I can't see to mend laces
except just at the window, where there's
always a shocking draught—enough to give
one one's death of cold."

"Well, I dare say you will have both good
light and plenty of warmth at Naples. You
must keep as much of your darning as you
can till then. Thank you, Newton, I can
take them down—you're busy."

So Margaret went down laden with shawls,
and snuffing up their spicy Eastern smell.
Her aunt asked her to stand as a sort of lay
figure on which to display them, as Edith
was still asleep. No one thought about it; but
Margaret's tall, finely-made figure, in the black
silk dress which she was wearing as mourning
for some distant relative of her father's, set
off the long beautiful folds of the gorgeous