e you ask Sarah to come up," said Phillida.

On Sarah's arrival Phillida asked her who brought this letter.

"It wuz that young man with the short side whiskers just under his ears
and a cap that's got a front before and another one behind, so't I don't
see for the life of me how he gets it on right side before."

"The man that brought flowers when I was sick?"

"That very same, Miss."

"All right, Sarah. That'll do." Then when Sarah had gone Phillida leaned
her head back and said:

"It won't do, Mother. We can't accept it."

It was a tedious week after Dr. Gunstone's last visit before a trip was
finally determined on and a destination selected, and Mrs. Callender,
who had a genius for thoroughness, demanded yet another week in which to
get ready. Phillida, meanwhile, sat wearily waiting for to-morrow to
follow to-day.

"Mother," she said, one day, rousing herself from a reverie, "what a
good fellow Cousin Philip is, after all! I used to feel a certain
dislike for what seemed to me irresolution and inactivity in him. But
ever since I was taken sick he has been just like a brother to me."

"He has taken charge of us," said Mrs. Callender. "He has inquired about
board for us at Hampton, and he has worked out all the routes by rail
and steamboat."

Philip's kindness to his aunt's family was originally self-moved, but,
as Phillida convalesced, his mother contrived to send him with messages
to her, and even suggested to him that his company would be cheering to
his cousin. Philip sat and chatted with her an hour every day, but the
exercise did not raise his spirits in the least. For his mother
frequently hinted that if he had courage he would be more prompt to
avail himself of his opportunities in life. Philip could have no doubt
as to what his mother meant by opportunities in life, and he knew better
than any one else that he was prone to waste his haymaking sunshine in
timid procrastinations. But how to make love to Phillida? How offer his
odd personality to such a woman as she? His mother's severe hints about
young men who could not pluck ripe fruit hanging ready to their hand
spurred him, but whenever he was in Phillida's presence something of
preoccupation in her mental attitude held him back from tender words. He
thought himself a little ridiculous, and when he tried to imagine
himself making love he thought that he would be ten times more absurd.
If he could have got into his favorite position in an arm-cha