nd statement last evening in the very same words. Who shall say
it is not an immense advantage to have a brother so full of sage maxims,
while his sisters are seen to catch up his words of wisdom, and actually
believe them to be their own?"

"Temple may not be a Talleyrand; but he is certainly as brilliant as
the charming curate," said Marion, tartly.

"Oh, poor George!" cried Nelly; and her cheek flushed, while she tried
to seem indifferent. "Nobody ever called him a genius. When one says he
is very good-looking and very good-humored, _tout est dit!_"

"He is very much out of place as a parson."

"Granted. I suspect he thinks so himself."

"Men usually feel that they cannot take orders without some stronger
impulse than a mere desire to gain a livelihood."

"I have never talked to him on the matter; but perhaps he had no great
choice of a career."

"He might have gone into the army, I suppose? He'd have found scores of
creatures there with about his own measure of intelligence."

"I fancied you liked George, Marion," said the other. And there was
something half tender, half reproachful, in her tone.

"I liked him so far, that it was a boon to find anything so like a
gentleman in this wild savagery; but if you mean that I would have
endured him in town, or would have noticed him in society, you are
strangely mistaken."

"Poor George!" and there was something comic in her glance as she sighed
these words out.

"There; you have won," said Marion, throwing down her mallet. "I must
go and hear what Temple is going to do. It would be a great blessing to
see a man of the world and a man of mark in this dreary spot, and I hope
papa will not lose the present opportunity to secure him."

"Are you alone, Nelly?" said her eldest brother, some time after, as he
came up, and found her sitting, lost in thought, under a tree.

"Yes. Marion got tired and went in, and Temple went to ask papa
about inviting some high and mighty personage who chances to be in our
neighborhood."

"Who is he?"

"Lord Culduff, he called him."

"Oh! a tremendous swell; an ambassador somewhere. What brings him down
here?"

"I forget. Yes! it was something about a mine; he has found tin, or
copper, or coal, I don't remember which, on some property of his here.
By the way, Augustus, do you really think George L'Estrange a fool?"

"Think him a fool?"

"I mean," said she, blushing deeply, "Marion holds his intelligence so
cheaply that she