And the old man looked at his son with that contemptuous pity age often bestows on a youth who throws away a fine appetite on a dinner of one course. They were at the stable-door, and as Stephen slowly got out of his stirrups, he added:

"It is not hard to forget, Lance. Atherton for a week or two. mind, my lad."

Out

Keep away from of sight is out of

But while the father was giving orders about the weary horses, and talking of oats and buckles and saddles, Lance was walking through the leafless garden, singing softly to himself:

"That out of sight is out of mind,

Is true of most we leave behind;

It is not true, nor can be true,
My own, my only love, of you!'"

H

CHAPTER IV.

MARRYING AND PROMISE OF MARRIAGE.

The fountains mingle with the river,
And the rivers with the ocean;

The winds of heaven mist forever
With a sweet emotion.

Nothing in the world is single,
All things by a law divine,
"In one another's being mingle,
Why not I with thine?"

OWEVER careful we are in the arrangement of

our plans, something, and often the most important thing, escapes consideration. Squire Atherton in encouraging the visit of his daughter to Idleholme never reflected on the possibility of its being in the neighborhood of Leigh Farm, nor yet that the two families might be acquainted with each other. Yet both of these circumstances existed, and they were made evident to Francesca a few days after her arrival at Idleholme.

As her stay was likely to extend over some weeks, she was accompanied by her own riding-horses and groom; and one morning, when every one appeared to be exclusively occupied with affairs relating to the approaching marriage, she determined on a gallop across the wold, attended only by her servant. She was accustomed to a life so quiet and so full of orderly refinement that the hurry and laughter, the endless demands, the running about, the sense of feasting, and of prepara.

tion for more feasting, had become excessively tiresome to her. She was nervous and fretful, and longing for the peace of Nature, even though Nature appeared to be hostile.

For the weather was gray and wintry, and the black, low-hanging clouds portended a coming storm. Jane protested and Miss Loida advised, but Francesca was not to be moved from her desire.

"If I do not ride this morning I cannot dance tonight," she said. "I am tired of human beings. Let me take my own way now, and I will take every one's way afterward.”

She had been, indeed, singularly affected by daily contact for a week with Jane's brother, a young man of distinctly modern type. Almund Idle had been everywhere and had seen everything. He could play billiards, and quote Horace, and make money on the stock exchange. Small, alert, and rather handsome, he was also polished and exceedingly proper; there were no angles about him, and he had no illusions.

"I am not at ease in his company," Francesca said to her aunt. "If there is any thought in my heart, I need not put it into words; he is sure to know all about it."

"Your father thinks very well of Almund Idle. He will be a great man, Francesca, and I think he is fond of ladies' society."

"He is very fond of his sister Jane, and she is as clever as her brother."

"He was saying yesterday that Shakespeare had a miraculous intelligence in making Hamlet sisterless. He thought Hamlet failed in being a hero because he

had no sister to help him. His mother was not good, and Ophelia withdrew, and there was no sister Jane That was the way he put it."

near.

Francesca was buttoning her habit, and she tossed her beautiful head a little scornfully as she answered Miss Loida:

"It was Hamlet's own fault that Ophelia withdrew. I heard Jane teasing her brother yesterday about some young lady she called Lydia. I hope he is engaged. I should feel so much more at ease with him if I knew he was human enough to be in love."

Then she kissed her aunt and went out into the grim winter day; for no scenery in England is sadder and wilder than that of the West Riding in winter weather. The bleak range of low hills before her was partitioned into fields by leagues and leagues of stone walls, and here and there she came upon a dreary village or a desolate mansion standing forlorn on the bare wold.

The uncouth manner, and the strong, rude dialect of the quarrymen she met was disconcerting. They stared at her with sullen ill-will, or looked down upon the earth as they passed her. The very sheep lifted their heads as if annoyed at her intrusion, and watched her suspiciously as she rode away into the gray dull dampness enveloping the landscape.

It was a relief to come suddenly upon a little church set in a grove of yew trees. There were a number of carriages around it, and some rosy-cheeked children: "It wer' a wedding doo-ment." They were waiting for bride coins, and in the interval spelling, across the churchyard gate, a name and date across a marble slab standing white and lonely near by.

She read it to them:

"You shall pray for the souls of Bernard and Margaret Dysart, who died A.D. 1600.'”

Then she went thoughtfully onward. There was a nearness to heaven in the words; a sure belief that God's mercy for departed souls was still to be reached by human intercession, that gave to her a singular serenity. The world seemed instantly another place. She began to pray for the souls of Bernard and Margaret Dysart; and the act made her realize something of that personal communication with God which Adam lost and which Protestants reject.

The few solemn words lifted her above the dreeping atmosphere, and then-so startling are the antitheses of life-out rang the wedding-chimes

"Low at times and loud at times,

Rang the beautiful old chimes."

And, as she listened, the wind changed, and snow began to fall. She was at least six miles from Idleholme, and she looked around for some house in which she could take shelter.

"If we could find a cottage, Peel," she said to her groom, "I would remain there until you went back and sent the carriage for me. I do not like to ride through

a snow-storm."

She was really thinking how uncomfortable it would. be for every one if she took cold and was ill during the wedding festivities.

"I should think there was a house behind yonder plantation of firs, Miss Atherton. It is not more than half a mile away."