he counting of
one of these upright heaps, showed that the box contained five
hundred of these golden coins, which as yet were only just coming
into general circulation.

"Oh," cried Gertrude in amaze, "what can she have done it for? And
they call Lady Scrope a miser!"

"Misers often have strange fancies; and Lady Scrope has always been
one of the strangest and most unaccountable of her sex," said
Reuben. "I cannot explain it one whit. It is of a piece with much
of her inscrutable life. All we can do is to give her our gratitude
for her munificence. She has neither kith nor kin to wrong by her
strange liberality to thee, sweet Gertrude; nor can I marvel that
she should have come to love thee so well. Sweet heart, this money
will purchase the house upon the bridge which thy father tells us
he is forced to sell. I had thought that I would buy it of him for
our future home. But thou hast the first claim. At least, now the
place is safe. What is mine is thine, and what is thine is mine,
and we will together make the purchase, and give him a home with us
beneath the old roof.

"Will that make you happy, dear heart? Methinks it will please Lady
Scrope that her golden hoard should help in such an act of filial
love!"

And Gertrude could only weep tears of pure happiness on her lover's
shoulder, and marvel how it was that such untold joy had come to
her in the midst of the very shadow of death.

CHAPTER XIV. BRIGHTER DAYS.

"The plague is abating! the plague is abating! The bills were lower
by two thousand last week! They say the city is like to go mad with
joy. I would fain go and see what is happening there. Prithee, good
aunt, let me e'en do so much. I shall take no hurt. Methinks,
having escaped all peril heretofore, I may be accounted safe now."

This was Joseph's eager petition as he rushed homewards after a
stroll in the direction of the town one evening early in October.
There had been rumours of an improvement in the health of the city
for perhaps ten days now, notwithstanding the fearful mortality
during the greater part of September. Therefore were the weekly
bills most eagerly looked for, and when it was ascertained that the
mortality had diminished by two thousand (when, from the number of
sick, it might well have risen by that same amount), it did indeed
seem as though the worst were over; and great was the joy which
Joseph's news brought to those within the walls of that cottage
home.

Yet Mary