he two
walked slowly forward.

"You must know, Miss Stansfield," proceeded the stranger, "that I have
both seen you before and have also heard a good deal about you, though
we have never met till to-day.--Ah, I know what you would say," he
added, with a smile, as he noticed her look of extreme surprise and her
blush of bewilderment. "You are thinking, What can I have heard about
one who is leading such a commonplace, retired life as yours? I will
tell you. I have been rather anxious to know what sort of neighbours I
shall have round me here, so I have been getting a little reliable
information on the subject--where from it matters not; and my informant
has told me about an old lady whose estate adjoins Riverton Park, and
who has a niece living with her who belongs to a class for which I have
a special respect, and which I may call `workers in the shade.' Do you
understand me?"

"Perfectly," replied his companion; "only I feel utterly unworthy of
being included in such a class."

"Of course you do. And just for this reason, because you're in the
habit of burning candles instead of letting off fireworks; and so you
think your humble candles aren't of much service because they don't go
off with a rush and a fizz. Is that it?"

"Perhaps it may be so," said the other, laughing.

"Well, do you remember what Shakespeare says?" asked the old man.

"`How far that little candle throws its beams,
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.'

"Now, I want you kindly to answer me a question. It is this, Are there
any unselfish people in Franchope or the neighbourhood?"

The question was put so abruptly, and was so odd in itself, that Mary
Stansfield looked in her companion's face with a half misgiving. He
noticed it instantly. "You're a little doubtful as to the old
gentleman's vanity?" he said, laughing; "but I'm quite sane and quite in
earnest; and I repeat my question."

"Really," said the other, much amused, "it is a very difficult question
to answer. I hope and believe that there are many unselfish persons in
our neighbourhood, or it would be sad indeed."

"Ah! True," was his reply, "but hoping is one thing, and believing is
another. Now, I've been half over the world, and have come back to my
own country with the settled conviction that selfishness is the great
crying sin of our day; and it seems to me to have increased tenfold in
my own native land since I last left it. So I should very much like to