nd a
wealthy dowry to her husband.

But the marriage had not been a happy one, and the three last years of
Mrs. Ferrers' life had been passed away from her husband. There were
hints and tales of bitter scenes in the Grange, but little was known
in the village; only, when Margaret was seven years old, and Raby a
lad of fourteen, there was a grand funeral, such as Sandycliffe had
never witnessed, and Mrs. Ferrers was laid in the same marble tomb
where her predecessor was buried, and it was noted with some surprise
and a little incredulity that Colonel Ferrers seemed overcome with
grief.

It was about fourteen months before Raby had stood in the large porch
waiting for his glass of milk that one summer's morning the little
church-yard was full of loitering villagers, waiting for the bells to
stop before they hurried into their places.

The white Lady from the Grange, as some of the children called her, had
just passed into the porch, after stopping to reprove some noisy urchins
eating small sour apples on the tombstones; and old Granny Richardson
had just hobbled in after her in her red cloak and neat black bonnet,
and her prayer-book folded in a blue and white checked handkerchief
with a little bunch of sweet-william and southern-wood--old man they
called it in those parts--to keep it company. After granny came old
Samuel Tibbs, the patriarch of the village, in his clean smock and
scarlet handkerchief, followed by his youngest grandson in all the
glories of corduroys and hob-nailed boots. Young Sam, as they called
him, was the youngest of fifteen, who had all grown up strong and
healthy under the thatched eaves of the low, whitewashed cottage down
by the pond. There the fifteen young Tibbses had elbowed, and jostled,
and kicked, and metaphorically pecked at each other like young rooks
in a nest, and had grown up strong and hearty on a diet of bread and
treacle alternating with slices of bread and dripping, running
barefoot over the grass and splashing like young ducks in the pond,
until promoted to hob-nailed boots and bird-scaring, with a promise of
riding the plow-horses to water, and an occasional bird-nesting
expedition on their own account.

The bell had stopped, and the last loiterer had taken his place on the
oak bench, when as usual two strangers took their places in a seat
that was usually occupied by any chance worshiper.

Most of the little congregation were familiar with the features of the
younger man,