erwards. It is only canals that
flow languidly in parallel lines, and meet, if they meet at all, by the
orderly contrivance of a lock.

In the morning the two were off for a stroll. There is a hill from which
a most extensive prospect is had of the city, the teeming valley, with
a score of villages and innumerable white spires, of forests and meadows
and broken mountain ranges. It was a view that Margaret the night before
had promised to show Henderson, that he might see what to her was the
loveliest landscape in the world. Whether they saw the view I do not
know. But I know the rock from which it is best seen, and could fancy
Margaret sitting there, with her face turned towards it and her hands
folded in her lap, and Henderson sitting, half turned away from it,
looking in her face. There is an apple orchard just below. It was in
bloom, and all the invitation of spring was in the air. That he saw all
the glorious prospect reflected in her mobile face I do not doubt--all
the nobility and tenderness of it. If I knew the faltering talk in
that hour of growing confidence and expectation, I would not repeat it.
Henderson lunched at the Forsythe's, and after lunch he had some talk
with Miss Forsythe. It must have been of an exciting nature to her, for,
immediately after, that good woman came over in a great flutter, and
was closeted with my wife, who at the end of the interview had an air of
mysterious importance. It was evidently a woman's day, and my advice was
not wanted, even if my presence was tolerated. All I heard my wife say
through the opening door, as the consultation ended, was, "I hope she
knows her own mind fully before anything is decided."

As to the objects of this anxiety, they were upon the veranda of the
cottage, quite unconscious of the necessity of digging into their own
minds. He was seated, and she was leaning against the railing on which
the honeysuckle climbed, pulling a flower in pieces.

"It is such a short time I have known you," she was saying, as if in
apology for her own feeling.

"Yes, in one way;" and he leaned forward, and broke his sentence with
a little laugh. "I think I must have known you in some pre-existent
state."

"Perhaps. And yet, in another way, it seems long--a whole month, you
know." And the girl laughed a little in her turn.

"It was the longest month I ever knew, after you left the city."

"Was it? I oughtn't to have said that first. But do you know, Mr.
Henderson, you