enough now.

"Phoebe, you must be a lunatic!" burst from her mother. "I could not
have believed you would be guilty of such supreme, unpardonable folly!"

"Sure," said Phoebe, looking up, "you would never have had me marry a
man whom I despised in my heart?"

"Despised! I protest, Phoebe, you are worse and worse. What do you
mean by saying you despise Mr Welles? A man of excellent manners and
faultless taste, of good family, with an estate of three thousand a
year, and admirable prospects when his old uncle dies, who is nearly
seventy now--why, Phoebe, you must be a perfect fool! I am amazed at
you beyond words."

There was a light in Phoebe's eyes which was beyond Mrs Latrobe's
comprehension.

"Mother!" came from the girl's lips, with a soft intonation--"Father
would not have asked me to do that!"

"Really, my dear, if you expect that I am to rule myself by your
father's notions, you expect a great deal too much. He was not a man of
the world at all--"

"He was not!"

"Not in the least!--and he had not the faintest idea what would be
required of you when you came to your present position. Don't quote
him, I beg of you!--Well, really, Phoebe--I don't know what to do now.
I wish I had known of it! Still I don't see, if he were determined to
speak to you, how I could have prevented you from making such a goose of
yourself. I do wish he had asked me! I should have accepted him at
once for you, and not given you the chance to refuse. What did you say
to him? Is it quite hopeless to try and win him back?"

"Quite," said Phoebe, shortly.

"But I want to know exactly what you said."

"I told him I believed he wanted the estate, and not me; and that after
behaving to my cousin as he did, he did not need to expect to get either
it or me."

"Phoebe! what preposterous folly!" said Mrs Latrobe. "Well, child, you
are a fool--that's as plain as a pikestaff; but--"

"You're a fool!" came in a screech from the parrot's cage, followed by a
burst of laughter.

"But 'tis no use crying over spilt milk. If we have lost Mr Welles, we
have lost him; and we must try for some one else. Oh dear, how hot it
is! Phoebe, I wonder when you will have any sense. I do beseech you,
my dear, never to play the same game with anyone else."

"I hope, Mother," said Phoebe, gravely, "that I shall never have
occasion."

"What a lot of geese!" said the parrot.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

ENDS IN THE MAIDENS' LODGE.

"Moth