cept when compelled by a question
to attend to her, was wondering who the fair girl could be, who was
separated from her companion not less by the tasteful arrangement of her
dress--simple and even coarse as it was in its material--and by a
certain grace of movement, than by her delicate beauty. Her form was
slender in proportion to its height, yet gave in its graceful outline
promise of a development "rich in all woman's loveliness;" and her face,
with its dark starry eyes, its clear, transparent skin, and rich, waving
curls of glossy brown, recalled so vividly to Edward Houstoun's memory
his favorite description of beauty, that he repeated almost audibly:--

"One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair'd the nameless grace
That waves in every glossy tress,
Or softly lightens o'er her face,
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place."

His admiration, if not audible, was sufficiently evident to its
object--at least so we interpret her tremulous and uncertain movements,
the eloquent blood which glowed in her cheeks, and the mistakes which at
length aroused Mrs. Pye's attention.

"Why, Lucy! what under the sun and earth's the matter with you, child?
Dear--dear--to go putting the cream into the new milk, instead of
emptying it into the churn! There--there--child--better go in now--I'll
finish--and just tell Mr. Pye that Mr. Edward is here," said Mrs. Pye,
fearful of some new accident.

The discarded bonnet was put on with a heightened color, and the young
girl moved rapidly yet gracefully toward the house.

"I did not remember you had a daughter, Mrs. Pye," said Edward Houstoun,
as she disappeared.

"And I haven't a daughter--only the two boys, Sammy and Isaac--good big
boys they are now, and help their father quite some--but this girl's
none of mine, though I'm sure I love her 'most as well--she's so pretty
and nice, and has such handy ways, though what could have tempted her to
put the cream in the new milk just now, I'm sure I can't tell."

"But who is she, Mrs. Pye?"

"Who is she? Why, sure, and did you never hear of Lucy Watson? Oh!
here's Mr. Pye."

Edward Houstoun was too much interested in learning something more of
Lucy Watson, not to find a sufficient reason for lingering behind the
farmer, who was impatient to be in his hay-field. Mrs. Pye was
communicative, and he soon learned all she knew--that Lucy was the
daughter of a s