n this place as further on--Townley loved my
aunt. It should be remembered that at this time she was young, but little
over twenty, and in every way she was worthy to be the heroine of a
story.

Townley, however, was no fool. Although he was admitted to the
companionship of every member of our family, and treated in every respect
as an equal, he could not forget that there was a great gulf fixed between
the humble tutor and the youngest sister of the chief of the M'Crimmans.
If he loved, he kept the secret bound up in his own breast, content to
live and be near the object of his adoration. Perhaps this hopeless
passion of Townley's had much to do with the formation of his history.

* * * * *

Those dear old days of boyhood! Even as they were passing away we used to
wish they would last for ever. Surely that is proof positive that we were
very happy, for is it not common for boys to wish they were men? We never
did.

For we had everything we could desire to make our little lives a pleasure
long drawn out. Boys who were born in towns--and we knew many of these,
and invited them occasionally to visit us at our Highland home--we used to
pity from the bottom of our hearts. How little they knew about country
sports and country life!

One part of our education alone was left to our darling mother--namely,
Bible history. Oh, how delightful it used to be to listen to her voice as,
seated by our bedside in the summer evenings, she told us tales from the
Book of Books! Then she would pray with us, for us, and for father; and
sweet and soft was the slumber that soon visited our pillows.

Looking back now to those dear old days, I cannot help thinking that the
practice of religion as carried on in our house was more Puritanical in
its character than any I have seen elsewhere. The Sabbath was a day of
such solemn rest that one lived as it were in a dream. No food was cooked;
even the tables in breakfast-room and dining-hall were laid on Saturday;
no horse left the stables, the servants dressed in their sombrest and
best, moved about on tiptoe, and talked in whispers. We children were
taught to consider it sinful even to think our own thoughts on this holy
day. If we boys ever forgot ourselves so far as to speak of things
secular, there was Flora to lift a warning finger and with terrible
earnestness remind us that this was God's day.

From early morn to dewy eve all throughout the Sab