day, when this is all forgotten, I may see her

again.'

'I shall not forget; I know now that you are the first woman I ever truly loved,' said Anthony. Memory is treacherous on such points, for he had thought much of his thwarted attachment to his cousin, and a little also of the calmer courtship of his wife. But it is true that the stormy passions of youth do not shake the foundations of our nature like those of middle life.

You had better go now, Mr. Bertram,' said Mary faintly. She shrank from him when he essayed to put his hand round her waist, and he mistook the gesture for aversion.

May I not even say good-bye?' he asked. Then she placed her cold, trembling hand in his, but he did not venture to raise it to his lips. Dizzy and blind, like one on whom some great blow has fallen, Anthony left the

house. He wandered about the park for two hours, and did not return home until Sir Richard and Lady Bertram were sitting down to dinner.

Sir Richard took out his watch, but an imploring glance from his wife restrained the remark he was about to make on such unwonted inexactness.

I know that I am late; perhaps you will excuse my dressing, mother?' said Anthony; and, when Lady Bertram acquiesced with nervous eagerness, he took his place at the table. He neither ate nor drank anything, and scarcely spoke again until the cloth was removed and the servants had left the room. Thomasina came in to dessert, but her presence was no restraint on the communication which he had to make.

I wish to tell you, Sir Richard, that I relinquish the hope of making Miss Windsor my wife. Under these circumstances I have

a right to demand that the offer of marriage which her father was instrumental in rejecting ought not to be made a plea for depriving him of his livelihood.'

'I do not see what right your folly gives you to dictate to me,' said Sir Richard; but I have no objection to tell you that I wrote to Windsor before I sat down to dinner, informing him that my first letter was written in a passion, and that I do not mean to stand by it. Of course it is an understood thing that you will have no more to do with the girl, nor Thomasina either.'

'Let us come into the library together,' said Thomasina, taking her father's hand, and she left her plate of strawberries and cream untasted, to mark her indignant sense of Sir Richard's obduracy. She drew Anthony into the bay window, and they sat down side by side on the broad, leathercushioned seat. She softly stroked her

father's thin, grizzled hair, and spoke caressing words.

Poor Anthony! How unkind they all are to you!'

'She said that it was a mistake,' said An

thony; I think she meant that she could not love me.'

'She could not have meant that; Polly cannot help loving you. But everything is a mistake,' said Thomasina, stamping her little foot. Granny says that I must never see Polly again, and that she will get a governess to live in the house. I daresay that she will get Aunt Thomasina to choose one who is quite old and disagreeable, and I have a good mind to punish her and Sir Richard by saying that I would rather go to school.'

That would punish me too, my dear. You must not vex Sir Richard or your granny, for you know that they love you dearly.'

Then they ought to be kind and listen to what I have to say about Polly. I have been hunted about and told to hold my tongue, and it has been such a long, tiresome day that I shall go to bed now, and not even say good night to them.'

Anthony would willingly have followed her example, but, instead of yielding to the inclination, he went as usual to play piquet with his mother. Her manner was really tender and caressing that evening, but it was not a tenderness which could give any solace to his harassed spirits; she had got her own way, and could afford to be affectionate. When Lady Bertram was going to bed Anthony said abruptly, I think of riding down to the "Gloucester " Gloucester" at Weymouth to-morrow, mother. I shall send one of my horses on and stay a few days.'

6

It is a very good plan,' said Lady Ber

tram; that will give time for the whole