inks of the poverty that clings to the Batley _menage_
from year's end to year's end.

"Well, never mind; she shall have it all next week," promises
Clarissa, soothingly, marking his regretful tone; and then she bids
him farewell, and goes up the road again in the direction of her home.

She is glad to be alone at last. Her mission successfully
accomplished, she has now time to let her heart rest contentedly upon
her own happiness. All the events of the morning--the smallest word,
the lightest intonation, the most passing smile, that claimed Horace
as their father--are remembered by her. She dwells fondly on each
separate remembrance, and repeats to herself how he looked and spoke
at such-and-such moments.

She is happy, quite happy. A sort of wonder, too, mixes with her
delight. Only a few short hours ago she had left her home, free,
unbetrothed, with only hope to sustain her, and now she is returning
to it with her hope a certainty,--bound, heart and soul, to the
dearest, truest man on earth, as she believes.

How well he loves her! She had noticed his sudden paling when she had
begged for some delay before actually naming her "brydale day." She
had hardly believed his love for her was so strong, so earnest: even
she (how _could_ she? with tender self-reproach) had misjudged him,
had deemed him somewhat cold, indifferent; unknowing of the deep
stratum of feeling that lay beneath the outward calm of his demeanor.

Dear, dearest Horace! She will never disbelieve in him again; he is
her own now, her very own, and she loves him with all her heart, and
he loves just the same, and----Oh, if every woman in the world could
only be as happy as she is to-day, what a glorious place it would be!

Not that it is such a bad place, by any means, as some people would
lead one to imagine. Surely these are disagreeable people,
misanthropists, misogamists, and such like heretics; or else, poor
souls! they are in a bad strait, without present hope and without any
one to love them! This last seems, indeed, a misfortune.

Yet why abuse a lovely world? How bright the day is, how sweet and
fresh the air, though evening is nigh at hand! She hardly ever
remembers a September so fine, So free from damp; the very birds----

Had he thought her unloving or capricious when she pleaded for a
longer engagement? (Here the tears rise unbidden in her eyes.) Oh,
surely not; he understood her thoroughly; for had he not smiled upon
her afterwards?