Lady Merton, Colonist

re all day, and get your death of cold? Why don't

a novel at home--and

tself grass, all of it as flat as your hand--oh! and, by Jove! a little brown fellow--gopher, is that their silly name?--scootling along the line. Go it, young 'un!" Philip shied the r

e, Philip--her

n draw on their slates: a chimney in the middle, a door, a window on either side. Outside, about twenty ch

. Had she supposed that childre

ook no he

And not another sign of habitation anywhere--nothing--but the little house--on the ba

id Philip, exasperated. "I say, why doe

d to come i

ent kind of fellow,"

h opened

had taken any not

with novels, which Elizabeth recognized as new additions to their travelling store. "He begged or borrowed them somewhere from his f

cant civility to Mr. Anderson, and this trait of thoughtfu

will be here direct

ppose

lf down into the

ine is any more excited about Canada than I am. He told me last

th, as though someo

this journey, Elizabeth. W

im, Philip. He

youth shrewdly. "I think, Elizabeth

not behavi

im. Do you know what he was doing while

ntly confessed th

wamp--at the back of the house, reading a bo

, though she too laughed. "It was p

Elizabeth, he could read Greek at home.

en she moved up to him and laid a coaxing hand on his a

Delaine? Sha

tongue," said Lady Merton entreatingly. "When there

e wh

ve to stand by me." An expressi

rthur for an extra bear-leader, if that's what you mea

Nothing also could have been more energetic than Delaine's attempts to meet her. He had been studying Baedeker, and he made intelligent travellers' remarks on the subject of Southern Saskatchewan. He discussed the American "trek" into the province from

sently the real Arthur Delaine emerged. Had she heard of the most recent Etruscan excavations at Grosseto? Wonderful! A whole host of new clues! Boni--Lanciani--the whole learned wor

izzled hair, falling perpetually forward in strong waves, made a fine frame for his grey eyes and large, well-cut features. He ha

ite new to such travellers as she--who seemed to choose the very railway line itself, by preference, for their burrowings and their social gatherings. Then, as she saw, the wheat country was nearly done; a great change was in progress; her curiosity sprang to meet it. Droves of horses and cattle began to a

in the whole world," cried Delaine, with pleasant enthusiasm. "

lway by telephones? Mr. Anderson told me so; that some farmers actually make their fences into telephone lines, and that from that little hut over there you can speak to Montreal when you pleas

ld strike you so much--

arms, and a slight look of patience. "After all, you know, it may only be one

laughed an

gged up, through centuries of blind horror and mistake, how wonderful to see a nation made consciously!--before your eyes--by science and intelligence--everything thought of, everything foreseen! F

w capacity for dithyramb was no less

not without tartness--"will the new

m, really, even from themselves. And one thinks how Governments have taxed, and tortured, and robbed, and fleeced--Oh, surely, surely, the world improves!" She clasped her hands tightly on her knee, as though trying by the physical action to restrain the feel

n dealing with emigrants for generations; and there

h would not

s of this? Twelve years ago even--in all this Northwest--practically nothing. And then God said: 'Let there be a nation!'--and

waited ma

said laughing. "But find me a brew anywhere

hink, be pleased with yo

frowned

it from him? I assure y

you the material

he country and believe in it he wouldn't be going into its publ

on, I think,

h's tone was a

--regret that, with his ability, he has not the

l be one of the sh

at her with a c

on't belong to it. We can

rrupt habits!" put in Elizabeth hurriedly.

izabeth did not allow it. She could not help flushing; but as she bent over the side of the platform look

ster, came to the car to say that the Governor-General, Lord Wrekin, who had been addressing a meeting at Regina, was expected immediately, to

complications

overed with white flowers. Behind it came persons in black, a group of men, a

sed the car, Anderson

a questioning l

-the son of a widow. A week ago a vicious horse kicked him in the stable. He died yesterday morning. They are taking him back to Ontario to b

re, hidden in a long crape v

for the Governor-General is expected this very moment. The funeral ought to ha

lency!" cried Philip,

the body. The bearers let down the coffin gently to the ground, and stood waiting in hesitation. But there were no railway employés to help them. A flurried station-master and his staff were receiving the official party. Suddenly someo

ul, beautiful river-- Gather with the saints a

he arrival with curiosity. Lord Wrekin, seeing women in his path, saluted them; and they replied with a friendly and democratic nod. Then suddenly the Governor-General heard the singing, and perceived the black distant crowd. He inquired of the persons near him, and then passed on through the groups which had begun to gather round himself, raising his hand for silence. The passengers of the West-bound train had by now mostly desc

rs. Over the head of the Governor-General a couple of flags swelled in a light breeze--the Union Jack and the Maple Leaf; beyond the

o her. But no one heard what passed between them. Then, silently, the funeral crowd dispersed, and another crowd--of official

e at the window, and he hastened across to speak to her. They w

ou on your t

Elizabeth stammered a few words in praise of Canada. But he

teens in this country!--just as the curtain is

o-and-so and So-and-so--great friends of mine. D----'ll tell you all about the lumbering. Get somebody to show you the Chinese quarter. And there's a splendid old fellow--a C.P.R. man--did some of the

railway superintendents, and others--his hat on the back of his head, his pleasant laugh ringing every now and then above the clatter of

ed a farming

the Governor-Gen

cheated and bullied, and all the rest of it. Row about the railway, too. Shortage of cars; you know the old story. A regular wasp's nest, the whole thing! Well, the Governor-G

down beside Elizabeth, an

!" she said, smiling--with a littl

wait at Regina, had appeared to be asleep in a corner, with a battered slouch hat drawn down ove

with showers in its train. The signs of habitation became scantier, the farms fewer. Bunches of horses and herds of cattle widely scattered over the endless grassy plains--the brown lines of the ploughed fire-guards running beside the railway--the bents of winter grass, white in the storm-light, bleach

ing in her fur coat, with a little motion of her ha

son l

warm chinook-wind. And it is precisely here that the railway lands are selling at a high

f water. The train ran along beside it for a minute or

riv

le here. Give the land water--the wheat follows! South and North, even now, the wheat is spreading and driving out the ranchers. Irrigation i

e spoke, but a nation through him. "Splendid!" was the wor

on to go in. In the car Delaine and Philip were playing dominoes, in despair of anything more amusi

self on the afternoon of the sink-hole. He had meant to hold himself strictly in hand with this too attractive Englishwoman. On the contrary, he had never yet poured out so frankly

es that will stand firm against the prairie winds, and in the centuries to come turn this bare and boundless earth, this sea-floor of a primeval ocean, which is now Western Canada, into a garden of the Lord. Or from the epic of the soil, he would slip on to the human epic bound up with it--tale after tale of life in the ranching c

And yet she had renounced him? She had never loved him

nce, as the train moved off after a stoppage, an old badger leisurely shambling off the line itself. And once, too, amid a driving storm-shower, and what seemed to her unbroken formless solitudes, suddenly, a tent by the railway side, and the blaze of a fire; and as

year," said Anderson, smil

it seemed a parable

ds over the West, that spread a watery gold

Roc

e land, ran from north to south a vast chain of snow peaks,

fore her reflection in the glass. Her eyes were frowning and distressed; her cheeks glowed. Arthur Delaine, her old friend, had bade her a cold good night, and she kne

rest, she could not sleep; so quickened were all