r; and some of this same awakening pursues us in our
renewal of old intimacies, and we find ourselves continually warring with
our recollections.

Besides this, there is another source of uneasiness that presses
unceasingly. It is in imputing every change we discover, or think we
discover in our friend, to some unknown influences that have asserted their
power over him in our absence, and thus when we find that our arguments
have lost their old force, and our persuasions can be stoutly resisted, we
begin to think that some other must have usurped our place, and that there
is treason in the heart we had deemed to be loyally our own.

How far Kate and Gorman suffered under these irritations, I do not stop to
inquire, but certain it is, that all their renewed intercourse was
little other than snappish reminders of unfavourable change in each, and
assurances more frank than flattering that they had not improved in the
interval.

'How well I know every tree and alley of this old garden!' said he, as
they strolled along one of the walks in advance of the others. 'Nothing is
changed here but the people.'

'And do you think we are?' asked she quietly.

'I should think I do! Not so much for your father, perhaps. I suppose men
of his time of life change little, if at all; but you are as ceremonious as
if I had been introduced to you this morning.'

'You addressed me so deferentially as Miss Kearney, and with such an
assuring little intimation that you were not either very certain of _that_,
that I should have been very courageous indeed to remind you that I once
was Kate.'

'No, not Kate--Kitty,' rejoined he quickly.

'Oh yes, perhaps, when you were young, but we grew out of that.'

'Did we? And when?'

'When we gave up climbing cherry-trees, and ceased to pull each other's
hair when we were angry.'

'Oh dear!' said he drearily, as his head sank heavily.

'You seem to sigh over those blissful times, Mr. O'Shea,' said she, 'as if
they were terribly to be regretted.'

'So they are. So I feel them.'

'I never knew before that quarrelling left such pleasant associations.'

'My memory is good enough to remember times when we were not
quarrelling--when I used to think you were nearer an angel than a human
creature--ay, when I have had the boldness to tell you so.'

'You don't mean _that_?'

'I do mean it, and I should like to know why I should not mean it?'

'For a great many reasons--one amongst the number, that