r. Herrick would
have much in common, and the conversation at the dinner-table that
evening was unusually animated.

She and Elizabeth were attentive listeners, and on comparing notes
afterwards both of them owned that they had been struck with Mr.
Herrick's intelligence and broad-minded views.

The slight egotism that Elizabeth had detected seemed to drop from him
like a veil, and he showed his true nature; he was evidently a patient
and reverent searcher after knowledge, and his marked deference to the
elder scholar became him greatly. Dinah quite glowed with innocent
pleasure as she listened to them. "It is so seldom the dear vicar gets
any one to talk on his favourite subjects, but one could see that Mr.
Herrick is after his own heart," she remarked, as they sat on the
terrace drinking their coffee and waiting for the gentlemen to join
them.

"He is certainly very clever," observed Elizabeth thoughtfully.

"David was unusually quiet," went on Dinah; but her sister apparently
did not hear this, for she went on talking about the advantage of a
more varied reading.

"I am such an ignoramus," she continued, "when those men were talking
about the MSS. in that old unknown monastery, I felt like a little
goggle-eyed charity-school girl. When I get Mr. Herrick alone I mean to
ask him about the Behistun Inscription;" and then Mr. Carlyon strolled
towards them, followed by Cedric, and Elizabeth, who had finished her
coffee, advanced towards them.

"They are still at it tooth and nail," observed David in an amused
tone. "I should have stopped to listen to them, only this fellow was so
sick of the discussion. What a well-informed chap Herrick is!"

"So Dinah and I were saying," remarked Elizabeth, as they paced slowly
down the terrace. "Why were you so silent?" she continued; "you know a
good deal about these subjects too."

"Who? I! My dear Miss Elizabeth, you are quite mistaken. Ask the vicar,
and he will tell you that I am really a duffer in these matters. It is
a wise child who knows his own father, and I am wise enough to know my
own ignorance. Don't you know," with a smile, "it is easier to hold
one's tongue and listen in an intelligent manner than flounder about
out of one's depth among the billows of cuneiform inscriptions and the
insurmountable precipice of the Behistun Rock."

"Why do you undervalue yourself so?" returned Elizabeth gently; "don't
you know people take us at our own value? I have got it into