y true heart thine
arms entwine; My other dearer life in life, Look through my very soul
with thine."

And, reading the verses over and over again, to bring the proper
expression to her mother's face, the young girl marvelled that they
brought likewise a look so sad that she would fain have made some
excuse, and terminated the sitting.

"No, no, my dear; it amuses me, and I can talk with you the while."

But Mrs. Rothesay did not talk much; she was continually falling into a
reverie. Once she broke it with the words--

"Olive, my child, I think, now we lead a quieter life, your papa will
stay at home more. He seems to like this house, too--he never liked
Merivale."

"Dear old Merivale!" said Olive, with a sigh. It seemed ages since she
had left the familiar place.

"Do not call it _dear_. It was a dreary home. I did not think so at
first, but I did afterwards."

"Why, mamma?" asked Olive. She was glad to lure her mother on to talk a
little, if only to dispel the shadow which so ill became Mrs. Rothesay's
still fair face.

"You were too young to know anything then--indeed, you are now, almost.
But, somehow, I have learned to talk with you as if you were quite a
little woman, Olive, my dear."

"Thank you, mamma. And what made you dislike sweet Merivale?"

"It was when your papa first began to take his long journeys--on
business you know. He was obliged to do it, I suppose; but,
nevertheless, it was very dull for me. I never had such a dreary summer
as that one. You could not remember it, though--you were only ten years
old."

Olive did remember it faintly, nevertheless--a time when her father's
face was sterner, and her mother's more fretful, than now; when the
shadow of many domestic storms passed over the child. But she never
spoke of these things; and, lest her mother should ponder painfully on
them now, she began to talk of lighter matters. Yet though the sweet
companionship of her only daughter was balm to Mrs. Rothesay's heart,
still there was a pain there which even Olive could not remove. Was
it that the mother's love had sprung from the ruins of the wife's
happiness; and that while smiling gaily with her child, Sybilla
Rothesay's thoughts were with the husband who, year by year, was growing
more estranged, and whom, as she found out too late, by a little more
wisdom, patience, and womanly sympathy, she might perhaps have kept for
ever at her side?

But none of these mysteries came to the knowledg