ge what pleasure was before her. Even the
caution she receives from the Doctor cannot control her spirits
absolutely. She makes her little adieux, for a while, under a certain
control that surprises herself. But when, in her light-hearted ramble,
she comes to say good-bye to Madame Arles, toward whom her sympathies
seem to flow in spite of herself, she cannot forbear saying, "What harm,
pray, can there be in this?"

"Such a secret, _chere Madame_! I am going to New York, you know, with
Dr. Johns, the good man! and--such a secret! don't whisper it!--Papa has
come, and has sent for me, and we are to travel together!" And she
sprang at Madame Arles, and, clasping her arms around her neck, kissed
her with a vehemence that might have startled even a less excitable
person.

"Is it possible, my child! I wish you all joy, with all my heart."

And as if the exuberance of the wish had started her old ailment into
new vigor, she has clasped her hands wildly over that bosom, to stay, if
it might be, those inordinate throbbings.

But the adieux are at last all spoken. Mrs. Elderkin had said, "My
child, I rejoice with you; and if I never see you again,"--(for she had
her suspicions that the sudden movement had some connection with the
wishes of her father,)--"if I never see you again, I hope you may keep
always the simplicity and the love of truth I believe you have now."

Rose, almost bewildered by the gleeful excitement of her friend, enters
eagerly into all her arrangements, trips into her chamber to assist in
her packing, insists, over and over, that she must write _often_, and
_long_ letters.

Girls of sixteen or thereabout are prone to expectancies of this kind.
Their friendships cover reams. Their promises of never-dying attachment
are so full, so rich! But as the years drop these girl friends into
their separate spheres, with a new world of interests, domestic
buffetings, nursery clamor, growing up around them, the tender
correspondence, before they know it, is gone by. And the budget of sweet
and gushing school-day epistles is cut through and through with the
ruthless family shears to kindle the family lamp or to light the cigar
of some exacting and surly _pater-familias_.

"I suppose you will see Reuben in the city," Rose had said, in a chance
way.

"Oh, I hope so!" said Adele.

And of Reuben neither of them said anything more.

Then with what a great storm of embraces Adele parted from Rose! A
parting only for