ceived from Miss Ashton's family, cried shame
upon his fickleness and perfidy, as if he had seduced the young lady
into an engagement, and wilfully and causelessly abandoned her for
another.

Sufficient care was taken that this report should find its way to
Ravenswood Castle through every various channel, Lady Ashton being
well aware that the very reiteration of the same rumour, from so many
quarters, could not but give it a semblance of truth. By some it was
told as a piece of ordinary news, by some communicated as serious
intelligence; now it was whispered to Lucy Ashton's ear in the tone of
malignant pleasantry, and now transmitted to her as a matter of grave
and serious warning.

Even the boy henry was made the instrument of adding to his sister's
torments. One morning he rushed into the room with a willow branch in
his hand, which he told her had arrived that instant from Germany for
her special wearing. Lucy, as we have seen, was remarkably fond of
her younger brother, and at that moment his wanton and thoughtless
unkindness seemed more keenly injurious than even the studied insults of
her elder brother. Her grief, however, had no shade of resentment; she
folded her arms about the boy's neck, and saying faintly, "Poor Henry!
you speak but what they tell you" she burst into a flood of unrestrained
tears. The boy was moved, notwithstanding the thoughtlessness of his age
and character. "The devil take me," said he, "Lucy, if I fetch you any
more of these tormenting messages again; for I like you better," said
he, kissing away the tears, "than the whole pack of them; and you shall
have my grey pony to ride on, and you shall canter him if you like--ay,
and ride beyond the village, too, if you have a mind."

"Who told you," said Lucy, "that I am not permitted to ride where I
please?"

"That's a secret," said the boy; "but you will find you can never ride
beyond the village but your horse will cast a she, or fall lame, or the
cattle bell will ring, or something will happen to bring you back. But
if I tell you more of these things, Douglas will nto get me the pair of
colours they have promised me, and so good-morrow to you."

This dialogue plunged Lucy in still deeper dejection, as it tended to
show her plainly what she had for some time suspected, that she was
little better than a prisoner at large in her father's house. We have
described her in the outset of our story as of a romantic disposition,
delighting in ta