n of Lilian Devoe, who had shared all Mrs. Grahame's
ambitious hopes for her friend. From this period Lilian became the
inseparable companion of the young Trevanions, their only rival in her
heart being removed from her circle. She still considered Michael as
greatly superior to them, and indeed to all others, in personal
attributes, but she could seldom enjoy his society, since he resided in
the city; and as she approached to womanhood, and he exchanged the
vivacity of the boy for the man's thoughtful brow and more controlled
expression of feeling, their manner in their occasional interviews
assumed a formality which made it a poor interpreter of her heart's true
emotions.

At seventeen Lilian Devoe was an orphan, left to the guardianship of Mr.
Trevanion and Mr. Grahame, with a fortune which secured to her a
prospect of all the comforts, and many of the elegancies of life. This
fortune was the result of a successful speculation made by Mr. Devoe
about a year before his death, with the little sum, which, by judicious
management, he had saved from his salary during many years. It was a sum
too small to secure to his daughter a maintenance in case of his death,
and with a trembling and almost despairing heart he had thrown it on the
troubled sea of speculation. From that hour he knew no peace. His life
was probably shortened by his anxieties, and when he received the
assurance of the successful issue of his experiment, he had but a few
days to live. Before his death, Mr. Trevanion had spoken very kindly to
him, and both he and Mrs. Trevanion had expressed the most friendly
interest in Lilian, and had offered to receive her as a member of their
own family, when her "home should be left unto her desolate." Mr.
Grahame and his kind-hearted wife had already made the same offer, and
Mr. Devoe, with the warmest expression of gratitude, commended his
daughter to the guardianship of both his friends. It was winter when Mr.
Devoe died--the Trevanions were in the city, and, by her own wish,
Lilian passed the first few months of her orphanage at the cottage of
Mr. Grahame. Never was an orphan more tenderly received, more dearly
cherished.

Michael Grahame had now acquired his trade, and had entered into an
already established and profitable business with his former master, who
predicted that with his application, and his unusual talent and his
delight both in the theory of mechanics and the actual development of
that theory in pr