it was not my benevolent intention to lecture you at all

"Well, it was not my benevolent intention to lecture you at all, either in public or private, but since you speak of it so feelingly no doubt the need exists. First tell me what you have been doing all summer."

"Living out in the wild woods among the wild flowers, wild animals, wild Indians, and--"

"What a wild young man! I am positively afraid of you."

"Delightful! Please oblige me by remaining so. It is difficult for me to be appalling for any length of time, yet the emotion of fear must be cultivated in your mind at all hazards."

"And why?"

"Because you will never dare to lecture the awe-inspiring being of whom you are in mortal terror."

"Oh! are you sure of that? I met a famous lecturer the other day, and he assured me that he never stepped before an audience without suffering from fright; yet he did not spare his hearers on that account."

"Such is the hardheartedness of man. We expect more from a woman."

"More of a lecture, or more hardheartedness?"

"More of the latter--from you."

"Well I am under the impression that you will receive, before long, a good deal of the former from a young lady present. Are you aware that we are observed?"

"I am sure that one of us is the observed of all observers."

"It is kind of you not to add that politeness forbids you to say which. But what I mean is that since we began to talk I have twice encountered a glance from the darkest eyes I ever saw."

"They must belong to Mademoiselle DeBerczy."

"They do. That girl's eyes and hair are black enough to cast a gloom over the liveliest conversation."

"But her smiles are bright enough to illumine the gloom."

"Then it is a shame that she should waste them upon that rather slow-looking young man in front of her. Will you take me back to my seat and then go and see if you can release her from bondage?"

The request was immediately acceded to, and not long afterwards Helene DeBerczy and Edward Macleod were exchanging the light talk, not worth reporting, that springs so easily from those whose hearts are light.

Meantime where was Rose? To all outward appearance she was demurely listening to the remarks of a distinguished statesman, whose opinions were held to be of great weight, and whose form, at any rate, fully merited this description. He was so delighted to think that one so young and fair could be so deep. Alas! she was deep in a sense the gifted gentleman never knew. For, while the sweet head bowed assent, and the rose-bud lips unclosed to utter such remarks as "Ah, indeed! You surprise me!" and "Very true!" to statements of profound national import, her maiden meditations were as free as fancy. Before her mental vision the brilliant rooms with their gay well-dressed assemblage melted away, and in their place was a fair green meadow, wide and waving and deliciously cool under the declining sun of a summer evening. The last load of the second crop of hay was on its way to the barn, when a great longing desire took possession of her to ride on it. She walked out to the field, very slowly and feebly, but still she actually walked--and the whole cavalcade came to a dead stop at sight of her, for she had never been able to go any farther than the gate since her accident. Mr. Dunlop, and Allan, and the hired man, and even the oxen all stopped, and looked at her as though they expected to hear that the house was afire, or that the servant girl had run away with the butcher's boy. But when they found that nothing was wanted except a ride on a load of hay Mr. Dunlop said, "bless the child!" and held her up as high as he could reach. Then Allan lifted her the rest of the way, blushing as he did so. She remembered how beautifully clean he looked in his white shirt sleeves, and what clear warm shades of brown there were in the eyes and on the cheeks under the broad straw hat. She remembered, too, with a little warmth of feeling--not a very uncomfortable warmth of feeling--how, when the waggon made a great lurch going over a ditch, she had uttered a little scream, and laid strenuous hands of appeal upon the white sleeved arm, and how, when they came to another ditch, a brown palm had held fast to her trembling hand until the danger was over. Halfway in the barn door he made the oxen stop, until she had stood on tip toe, and put her hand among the little swallows in a nest under the eaves. Ah, what was there in the memory of new-mown hay to fill her with this sharp sweet pain? She awoke from her dream to a consciousness that the gentleman beside her was saying that it was sufficiently clear to every enlightened understanding that unless tum tum tum tum measures were instantly adopted mum mum mum mum would be the inevitable result.