itting down in the easy-chair, and then lying for a moment on the
sofa, that she might have a keener sense of the repose he would get from
those well-stuffed articles of furniture, which she had gone to Rotherby
on purpose to choose.

'Now, mother,' she said, when she had finished her survey, 'you have done
your work as well as any fairy-mother or god-mother that ever turned a
pumpkin into a coach and horses. You stay and have tea cosily with Mrs.
Pettifer while I go to Mrs. Linnet's. I want to tell Mary and Rebecca the
good news, that I've got the exciseman to promise that he will take Mrs.
Wagstaff's lodgings when Mr. Tryan leaves. They'll be so pleased to hear
it, because they thought he would make her poverty an objection to his
leaving her.'

'But, my dear child.' said Mrs. Raynor, whose face, always calm, was now
a happy one, 'have a cup of tea with us first. You'll perhaps miss Mrs.
Linnet's tea-time.'

'No, I feel too excited to take tea yet. I'm like a child with a new
baby-house. Walking in the air will do me good.'

So she set out. Holly Mount was about a mile from that outskirt of
Paddiford Common where Mrs. Linnet's house stood nestled among its
laburnums, lilacs, and syringas. Janet's way thither lay for a little
while along the high-road, and then led her into a deep-rutted lane,
which wound through a flat tract of meadow and pasture, while in front
lay smoky Paddiford, and away to the left the mother-town of Milby. There
was no line of silvery willows marking the course of a stream--no group
of Scotch firs with their trunks reddening in the level sunbeams--nothing
to break the flowerless monotony of grass and hedgerow but an occasional
oak or elm, and a few cows sprinkled here and there. A very commonplace
scene, indeed. But what scene was ever commonplace in the descending
sunlight, when colour has awakened from its noonday sleep, and the long
shadows awe us like a disclosed presence? Above all, what scene is
commonplace to the eye that is filled with serene gladness, and brightens
all things with its own joy?

And Janet just now was very happy. As she walked along the rough lane
with a buoyant step, a half smile of innocent, kindly triumph played
about her mouth. She was delighting beforehand in the anticipated success
of her persuasive power, and for the time her painful anxiety about Mr.
Tryan's health was thrown into abeyance. But she had not gone far along
the lane before she heard the sound o