u.'

He could think of nothing else to say just then, but could only stand
impatiently wishing for Mrs. Fleming's disappearance, that he might
somehow appropriate her eldest niece. But alas! when she went, Catherine
went out with her, and reappeared no more, though he waited some time.

He walked home in a whirl of feeling; on the way he stopped, and leaning
over a gate which led into one of the river-fields, gave himself up to
the mounting tumult within. Gradually, from the half-articulate chaos
of hope and memory, there emerged the deliberate voice of his inmost
manhood.

'In her and her only is my heart's desire! She and she only if she will,
and God will, shall be my wife!'

He lifted his head and looked out on the dewy field, the evening beauty
of the hills, with a sense of immeasurable change:--

Tears
Were in his eyes, and in his ears
The murmur of a thousand years.

He felt himself knit to his kind, to his race, as he had never felt
before. It was as though, after a long apprenticeship, he had sprung
suddenly into maturity--entered at last into the full human heritage.
But the very intensity and solemnity of his own feeling gave him a rare
clear-sightedness. He realized that he had no certainty of success,
scarcely even an entirely reasonable hope. But what of that? Were they
not together, alone, practically, in these blessed solitudes? Would they
not meet to-morrow, and next day, and the day after? Were not time and
opportunity all his own? How kind her looks are even now! Courage! And
through that maidenly kindness his own passion shall send the last,
transmuting glow.

CHAPTER VII.

The following morning about noon, Rose, who had been coaxed and
persuaded by Catherine, much against her will, into taking a singing
class at the school, closed the school door behind her with a sigh of
relief, and tripped up the road to Burwood.

'How abominably they sang this morning!' she said to herself, with
curving lip. 'Talk of the natural north-country gift for music! What
ridiculous fictions people set up! Dear me, what clouds! Perhaps
we shan't got our walk to Shanmnoor after all, and if we don't, and
if-if--' her cheek flashed with a sudden excitement-'if Mr. Elsmere
doesn't propose, Mrs. Thornburgh will be unmanageable. It is all Agnes
and I can do to keep her in bounds as it is, and if something doesn't
come off to-day, she'll be for