e you.'

'No,' he answered quietly, 'I think people attach more importance to such
measures than is warranted. I don't see any good end that is to be served
by going to die at Nice, instead of dying amongst one's friends and one's
work. I cannot leave Milby--at least I will not leave it voluntarily.'

But though he remained immovable on this point, he had been compelled to
give up his afternoon service on the Sunday, and to accept Mr. Parry's
offer of aid in the evening service, as well as to curtail his weekday
labours; and he had even written to Mr. Prendergast to request that he
would appoint another curate to the Paddiford district, on the
understanding that the new curate should receive the salary, but that Mr.
Tryan should co-operate with him as long as he was able. The hopefulness
which is an almost constant attendant on consumption, had not the effect
of deceiving him as to the nature of his malady, or of making him look
forward to ultimate recovery. He believed himself to be consumptive, and
he had not yet felt any desire to escape the early death which he had for
some time contemplated as probable. Even diseased hopes will take their
direction from the strong habitual bias of the mind, and to Mr. Tryan
death had for years seemed nothing else than the laying down of a burden,
under which he sometimes felt himself fainting. He was only sanguine
about his powers of work: he flattered himself that what he was unable to
do one week he should be equal to the next, and he would not admit that
in desisting from any part of his labour he was renouncing it
permanently. He had lately delighted Mr. Jerome by accepting his
long-proffered loan of the 'little chacenut hoss;' and he found so much
benefit from substituting constant riding exercise for walking, that he
began to think he should soon be able to resume some of the work he had
dropped.

That was a happy afternoon for Janet, when, after exerting herself busily
for a week with her mother and Mrs. Pettifer, she saw Holly Mount looking
orderly and comfortable from attic to cellar. It was an old red-brick
house, with two gables in front, and two clipped holly-trees flanking the
garden-gate; a simple, homely-looking place, that quiet people might
easily get fond of; and now it was scoured and polished and carpeted and
furnished so as to look really snug within. When there was nothing more
to be done, Janet delighted herself with contemplating Mr. Tryan's study,
first s