errupted his parent. "What do you think a girl
gets engaged for if it isn't to be cuddled?"

He surprised himself by his own acumen. The late Mrs. W. had not been in
the least that sort of lady, and he had never been engaged to anybody
else; yet here he was laying down the law with the serenest confidence.
Some divine instinct must be inspiring him. His son seemed less
favorably impressed with his sagacity.

"Ellen's not that sort of girl," said he.

"My dear fellow, they're all that sort. At least, that's my view of the
matter. Well, what's gone wrong?"

"I don't know," said Andrew sourly. "I can't make her out. She's
different somehow. It was almost as though she wasn't so fond of me."

"Are you sure you've done nothing to annoy her? They're very touchy, you
know."

"I haven't done a thing to annoy her. I can swear to _that_."

"Then," said Mr. Walkingshaw, with inspired conviction, "there's some
other fellow cutting you out."

Andrew started.

"Who?"

"Oh, I don't know all her neighbors. It's nobody she's met here, I
suppose."

"She never saw a man when she was here but Frank and me."

"Then it's some one in Perthshire," pronounced Mr. Walkingshaw,
emphatically but cheerfully.

Andrew frowned at his still brimming glass. He trusted that he did not
overvalue himself; at the same time, the idea of another being preferred
by a girl who had once enjoyed the privilege of being engaged to Andrew
Walkingshaw struck him as far-fetched.

"I don't think it's another man," he said.

"It's my opinion it is, Andrew; and I'm not wanting to lose so nice a
daughter-in-law, so you've got to see that she doesn't turn round
altogether. You've got to go in and win; make sure of her, my boy!"

Mr. Walkingshaw grew more and more animated and his son more and more
distressed. He was behaving so unlike the senior partner in Walkingshaw
& Gilliflower.

"What are you wanting me to do?"

"Behave less like a damned umbrella," pronounced Mr. Walkingshaw, with
a startling lapse into epigram.

Andrew stared.

"Oh?" said he.

"Be lively, and--er--amorous, and--ah--sparkling; that's the sort of
thing. Go in for a few new ties and waistcoats. Socks, too, are things
that the young men display considerable enterprise in. I was tempted
myself this afternoon by a shop window full of really remarkably chaste
hosiery--pale green with stripes! you'd look first class in them. I came
to the conclusion at last that perhaps I was ha