"I shouldn't wonder if she was to be an old maid," said Mountiford, getting up and standing with his back to the fire.

"Indeed, I shouldn't be at all surprised; and she quite deserves it," said Lady Crawdour. And ther she left the room.

66

But, indeed, I'd rather be an old maid than have married uncle John," I said, when the door was shut. "A dutiful observation," said my cousin.

66 Or I would rather be an old maid than marry Mr. Auchterlony."

"There I think you're mistaken," said Mountiford. "I've nothing to say for the governor; but Auchterlony isn't half a bad fellow if he wasn't such a muff. And besides, he might break his back next year; and then you'd have all the tin, and no one to bother you."

Thank you," I said, "for the suggestion; but if I marry I don't want my husband to break his back." “Oh, I forgot, you want to marry some one you're 'fond of. But that's indecent, Lilla."

I began to laugh now,-Lady Crawdour was not in the room.

"Don't laugh, miss, that's 'most improper.' Fifty years ago young ladies didn't laugh about such things."

"Good night, Mountiford; I'm getting very sleepy." My cousin held my hand, instead of letting it go. "Give me a kiss, Lil!"

"Indeed, I'll do nothing of the kind," I replied,

with a promptness that would have given great satisfaction to his mother had she known; "and let me go, Mounty, I'm very tired."

"You cross thing! why won't you give me a kiss?" "Because I won't."

"That's no reason; are you afraid it's 'improper?'" "No, I'm not, I don't think its improper at all; but just I don't want to kiss you, Mounty."

"You're not fond of me at all."

"Not at all." And this was quite true, of the kind of fondness he meant.

Ungrateful thing! Now I'm very fond of you." "Then you had better stop being, for it's not the slightest use."

"Oh! I know that. It's no use my being fond of any one who hasn't lots of money."

"It would be no use your being fond of me even if I had. Good night, Mounty," and I snatched away my hand, and ran out of the room, just turning at the door and bidding another adieu to my cousin.

But I did not sleep at all worse that night on account of my cousin's and aunt's prediction that I should be an old maid.

There were several others, Alec Landor, Lord Lesham's sixth son. That never got beyond a violent flirtation. I thought him quite the silliest young man of my acquaintance, so I did not mind at all that his father and mother frowned, and his brothers and sisters laughed at him about it. He vowed he would never forget me, though I told him he had much

better do so, as I certainly intended to forget him. When he took leave of me, on the eve of his departure with his regiment for Canada, he put a flower out of my bouquet into his white waistcoat pocket, "to cherish for ever," he said; but I always felt convinced that it went into the wash-tub with the waistcoat the next time that garment was sent to the laundress.

And young Bright, the lawyer's son, from Longhampton. He had the audacity to propose for me in writing to my uncle. I did not use such strong language about the "audacity" as my uncle and aunt and cousin did, but I did not like young Bright, so I tacitly agreed to the unequivocal and not very polite refusal which Sir John Crawdour instantly returned to his request.

And a few others, whom I shall not mention in more detail. But after all this, it is not to be wondered at that I became somewhat of a flirt-a very objectionable phase of the female character, I admit, though, strange to say, I never found it militate against me in any way.

CHAPTER III.

THE DUCHESNES.

TEXTON PARK was the handsomest place in North Longshire. The house was older and more picturesque than Crawdour Hall, and larger and better furnished than Landor Court, and for beauty and extent the park had no equal in the shire.

But Lord Texworth, when he came of age, and into his property, had developed an unhappy taste for horse-racing, which, whether it was that he had no talent for the business, or was unlucky at it, in a few years brought him to utter ruin, and his ancestral home into the market. It was sold, but under a peculiar reservation. Lord Texworth, when he found himself a penniless man, retired from the scene altogether, and put his affairs into the hands of his family solicitors, who sold the house and estate for a rather low figure, but retained the option of repurchase for a larger sum, by Lord Texworth or his heirs, from the new possessors or their heirs at any time within five-and-twenty years.

Mr. Duchesne bought it under these conditions, very well pleased with his bargain, for every one knew that Lord Texworth was utterly ruined, and that neither he nor his son-who was a very young child when these events happened-would ever be

able to buy it back again within the stipulated period.

Mr. Duchesne had been hitherto quite unknown to fame, except through the medium of a brass plate, inscribed "Duggins & Co." over the door of a provision store in Liverpool, where, as Mr. Duggins, he had realized an enormous fortune by speculations in pickled pork; the pig-particularly when he is salted down in barrels-being, if a less refined and exciting, at any rate a much safer animal to gamble with than his equine brother, through whose instrumentality poor Lord Texworth had come to grief.

But when Mr. Duggins bought Texton Park, he changed his name to Duchesne, ignored pickled pork, and started on a new career as a country gentleman. He bought a suit of hunting clothes for himself; diamonds, that vied with the Countess of Lesham's and Lady Crawdour's, for his wife; and sent his daughter, who must have been then about twenty years of age, to a boarding school, where the "court curtsey" was taught, and the rawest female material warranted to be turned out a "finished" young lady in three years; terms, three hundred per year,

But his vulgar name was all of the vulgarity which seems inseparable from pickled pork and Liverpool which Mr. Duchesne was able to free himself and his family from by these arrangements. Her nine hundred pounds' worth of polishing did indeed rub a little of the upper crust off Miss Duchesne; she did not conglomerate the English language quite to the