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Mr. Lyndham sprang forward. "Miss Sidney -Viola-one word, only one word," I heard him exclaim. I think she heard him, too, for a convulsive tremor shook her frame. The coachman checked his horses; again I exclaimed “ Go on, go on; we shall be too late for the stage," and again he cracked his whip; the mettled animals seemed to tear up the ground. For one fraction of a moment, I saw the figure of a man, hatless, breathless, with dank hair falling over his heated brow, striving, might and main, to keep pace with us: in vain! he flagged, he tottered, and throwing in a rose through the open window, vanished from my sight.

How different was that journey home, from the one so lately undertaken on the same road, with the same companion. In silence and in sorrow, we travelled onwards. Once only did Viola appear to take cognizance of aught passing around her, and that was at the first house where we stopped to change horses; she asked for a glass of water, and having placed the rose therein, once more threw herself back in the carriage, to indulge her own thoughts; perchance to contemplate the past with sorrow, the future with dismay. That rose was the second day fresh and blooming, as at the moment it was gathered; and Viola, I thought, noted it with pleasure; for she smiled as she gazed on it; albeit, her smile showed gloomily, enlightening her pallid countenance but

as the meteor enlightens the wintry sky, and, to the of fancy, leaves it darker than before.

eye

Alas! I reflected: parting is the test of love; if it then ring sterling, it is the genuine ore, and not the base counterfeit.

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MRS. Sidney had little time to comment on her daughter's appearance; she did just say, "I don't think the country air has given you any roses, Viola." But Mr. Sidney jocularly observed, "My dear Anne, how can you expect a young lady, whose lover is away, to look otherwise than pale and thin? Ah! you see, I've hit it," he continued, as his daughter blushed deeply at these remarks; "however, Viola, your patience will not be much longer tried : they have had a remarkably quick passage, and are already at Dover; we shall see them all to-morrow."

But not even until the morrow had Viola to wait for her first interview with Lord Glenalbert; late

that evening he arrived. I had retired early, fatigued by my journey, suffering in body, but far more in mind; I was, therefore, spared this first meeting. It passed off without exciting any suspicions in Lord Glenalbert's mind; indeed, his own agitation, his joy, which, as Mrs. Sidney described it, must, for one usually so calm and collected, have had the appearance of frenzy, would of itself have completely blinded him to any change in her demeanour; but, from all that I could gather from Mrs. Sidney's rambling details, Viola had certainly not betrayed herself.

"Poor thing!" said her mother in conclusion, "she looked very shy; but that of course."

I think it would have been impossible to meet with any person more entirely free from guile and dissimulation, than Lord Glenalbert; and, like most men of noble, generous natures, he scarcely dreamed of these failings in another; mistrust to him was a solecism in language; suspicion and jealousy were words of which he knew not the import. Thus predisposed, was it any wonder that he saw only in Viola's nervous, fluttered, embarrassed manner, augmented proof of her affection?

The Countess of Glenalbert now signified her intention of waiting on us. She came, escorted only by her son. I took a huge dislike to her the minute I saw her. She had been a beauty in her

Oh!

youth, and might still, I suppose, be considered a very fine woman. There was far more of repelling haughtiness than of dignity in the expression of her face, and form. She was tall and angular, with a slight exaggeration of the aquiline nose, jet black hair, here and there variegated with grey,—a lofty, yet very narrow forehead, and prominent staring eyes, that seemed to challenge homage and respect; but when she addressed her son, that haughty glance relaxed into one of unutterable tenderness. how fondly, how proudly, did she look on him, and yet it seemed to me that somewhat of reproach and sadness mingled in her gaze, as though she would have said "Infatuated young man! how could you thus demean yourself? Were there none in your own 'bright collateral sphere' whom you might have wedded, that you must 'abase your eyes' on this merchant's daughter." Indeed, I had never seen Viola appear to such disadvantage. She was as gauche as a nouvelle riche on her presentation day; stammered, and changed colour when she was addressed, and appeared to me to have even shrunk in stature. Lady Glenalbert smiled condescendingly; she took Viola's hand encouragingly, bowing her head gracefully and graciously, as a candidate for the East India Direction on his canvass, or an apprehensive member of parliament on the eve of a threatened dissolution: she even seemed greatly

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