avoided. "I
think not."

"Why--" he began.

"I do not think good men like heiresses."

He became strongly interested in a corn-field, and she resumed,

"Perhaps I should only do harm. It may be my duty to wait. All I wish to
know is, whether it is?"

"I see you are not like girls who know their duty, and are restless,
because it is not the duty they like."

"Oh! I like everything. It is my liking it so much that makes me
afraid."

"Even going to Ryde?"

"Don't I like the sailing? and seeing Harry too? I don't feel as if that
were waste, because I can sometimes spare poor Flora a little. We could
not let her go alone."

"You need never fear to be without a mission of comfort," said Dr. May.
"Your 'spirit full of glee' was given you for something. Your presence
is far more to my poor Flora than you or she guess."

"I never meant to leave her now," said Meta earnestly. "I only wished to
be clear whether I ought to seek for my work."

"It will seek you, when the time comes."

"And meantime I must do what comes to hand, and take it as humiliation
that it is not in the more obviously blessed tasks! A call might come,
as Cocksmoor did to Ethel. But oh! my money! Ought it to be laid up for
myself?"

"For your call, when it comes," said Dr. May, smiling; then gravely,
"There are but too many calls for the interest. The principal is your
trust, till the time comes."

Meta smiled, and was pleased to think that her first-fruits would be
offered to-morrow.

CHAPTER XXII.

"Oh, dear!" sighed Etheldred, as she fastened her white muslin, "I'm
afraid it is my nature to hate my neighbour."

"My dear Ethel, what is coming next?" said Margaret.

"I like my neighbour at home, and whom I have to work for, very much,"
said Ethel, "but oh! my neighbour that I have to be civil to!"

"Poor old King! I am afraid your day will be spoiled with all your toils
as lady of the house. I wish I could help you."

"Let me have my grumble out, and you will!" said Ethel.

"Indeed I am sorry you have this bustle, and so many to entertain, when
I know you would rather have the peaceful feelings belonging to the day
undisturbed. I should like to shelter you up here."

"It is very ungrateful of me," said Ethel, "when Dr. Spencer works so
hard for us, not to be willing to grant anything to him."

"And--but then I have none of the trouble of it--I can't help liking the
notion of sending out the Church to the island whence t