Beatrice

k in the cab, and sighe

he next three weeks. It is ridiculous to pay three guineas a week for rooms just for you an

o," said Geoffrey. "

say you will find it rather dull, but you like being dull. The old clergyman is a low stamp of man, and a bore, and as for the eldest daughter, Elizabeth, she's too awful

hink her horr

-it's downright unwomanly. But there is no doubt about her beauty. She is as nearly perfect as any girl I ever saw, though too independent looking. If only one had a daughter like that, how one might marr

rey, "how do you know

s in love with her. I saw that last night. He was hanging about for hours in the rain, outside the door, with a face like a ghost, till he knew whether she was dead or alive, and he has

eed he was glad to hear that she was in the way of such a comfortable settlement, but it is unfortunately a fact that one cannot be quite a

owever right-thinking they may be, and thi

a good way; she deserves it. I think the Welsh squi

ere we are, and there is Effie, skipping about like a

tomed, and for which her soul yearned with a fierce longing that would be incomprehensible to folk of a simpler mind. Everybody has his or her ideal Heaven, if only one could fathom it. Some would choose a sublimated intellectual leisure, made happy by the best literature of all the planets;

l things, including of course the entrée to the upper celestial ten, and she would ask no more from age to age. Let us hope that she will get it o

h a chastened warmth, and went, a pious prayer on her l

things into the portmanteaus and Effie jumped on them. Those which would not go in they bundled loose into the fly, till that vehicle looked like an old clothes ship. Then, as there was no room left for the

u would buy a house like that for you a

he money, dear

er have the

one day-when I am too old to

es to buy a house like that, woul

ould count," he answered, a

mark. Here a man, it was old Edward, was engaged in mending a canoe. Geoffrey glanced

out of which I was upset." Effie opened he

," she said; "I don'

d somebody will be drowned out of it one of these days. I wish it had gone to the bottom

has learnt a lesso

ch; they never learn nothing till it's too late, they don't, and then w

uitable to the wants of the place, was little short of an abomination in the eyes of Her Majesty's school inspectors, who from time to time descended upon Bryngelly for purposes of examination and fault-finding. They yearned to see a stately red-brick edifice, with all the l

now it. Beauty of a certain sort has perhaps more effect on children than on any other class, heedless and selfish as they often seem to be. They feel its power; it is an outward expression of the thoughts and dreams that bud in their unknowing hearts, and is somehow mixed up with their ideas of God and Heaven. Thus there was in Bryngelly a lit

ild between her parents, who listened to the Minister with much satisfa

an extemporary oration. "Look at that child," he said, pointing to the little girl; "she looks innocent, does she not? but if she does not find salvation, my brethren

te child fell forw

med of yourself, sir,

finely strung mind had given way, and she lapsed into a condition of imbecility. But her imbecility was not always passive. Occasionally fits of passionate terror would seize upon her. She would cry out that the fiends were coming to drag her down to torment, and dash herself against the wall, in fear hideous

r power over them was almost absolute.

and gave the time while they sung, and a pretty sight it was to see her do it. On this particular afternoon, just as the first verse was finished, the door of the roo

arked the music's time. Nearer and nearer drew Owen Davies, till at length he stood quite close, his lips slightly apart, h

il teachers, and then with a shout, seizing their caps, ran forth this way and that, welcomi

do, Mr. Davi

did not know that you h

stop the song to say how do you do. By the way, I

was a most dreadful accident. I cannot te

to take so much intere

est in you? I have brought you some books-the Life of Darwin-it is in t

very much. Hav

me, you know. I think that he was a rather misgu

straight home; I am going to ol

aughter. But to reach the Vicarage she must pass along the cliff, where there were few people, and this she did not wish to do. To be frank, she feared lest Mr. Davies should take the opportunity to mak

me there would be a scene. Not that her resolution to refuse the man had ever faltered. But it would be painful, and in the end it must reach the ears of her father and Elizabeth that she had actually rejected Mr. Owen Davies,

. They went in silence, Beatrice just a little ahead. She ventured some remark about the weather, but Owen Davies made no reply; he was thinking, he

said in a somewhat

k at that seagull; it ne

ll. "Miss Beatrice," he said again, "are yo

l, Mr. Davies?

do walk on the beach on Sunday. Miss Beatrice, I want t

ng was unendurable; it would be better to get it over.

heatre opposite the Red Rocks, at four o'clock on Sunday afternoo

doggedly, and they went down

o was drownded with you and a gentleman," and to Beatr

the man Honoria said she was engaged to. W

with Beatrice, and was introduced to Owen Davies, who mur

owly up to the Vicarage, Beatrice holding Effie by t

here they carried us ashore. The sea does not look as though it would drown any one to-night,

chance that had brought them together in an hour of deadly peril and now left them together in an hour of peace. Perhaps, too, they