lena daringly. "I did not
think that Martha would be ready to go so soon. I should have shown
you how pretty they looked among their green leaves. We put them in
one of your best white dishes with the openwork edge. Martha shall
show you to-morrow; mamma always likes to have them so." Helena's
fingers were busy with the hard knot of a parcel.

"See this, cousin Harriet!" she announced proudly, as Martha
disappeared round the corner of the house, beaming with the pleasures
of adventure and success. "Look! the minister has sent me a book:
Sermons on _what_? Sermons--it is so dark that I can't quite see."

"It must be his 'Sermons on the Seriousness of Life;' they are the only
ones he has printed, I believe," said Miss Harriet, with much pleasure.
"They are considered very fine discourses. He pays you a great
compliment, my dear. I feared that he noticed your girlish levity."

"I behaved beautifully while he stayed," insisted Helena. "Ministers
are only men," but she blushed with pleasure. It was certainly
something to receive a book from its author, and such a tribute made
her of more value to the whole reverent household. The minister was
not only a man, but a bachelor, and Helena was at the age that best
loves conquest; it was at any rate comfortable to be reinstated in
cousin Harriet's good graces.

"Do ask the kind gentleman to tea! He needs a little cheering up,"
begged the siren in India muslin, as she laid the shiny black volume of
sermons on the stone doorstep with an air of approval, but as if they
had quite finished their mission.

"Perhaps I shall, if Martha improves as much as she has within the last
day or two," Miss Harriet promised hopefully. "It is something I
always dread a little when I am all alone, but I think Mr. Crofton
likes to come. He converses so elegantly."

II.

These were the days of long visits, before affectionate friends thought
it quite worth while to take a hundred miles' journey merely to dine or
to pass a night in one another's houses. Helena lingered through the
pleasant weeks of early summer, and departed unwillingly at last to
join her family at the White Hills, where they had gone, like other
households of high social station, to pass the month of August out of
town. The happy-hearted young guest left many lamenting friends behind
her, and promised each that she would come back again next year. She
left the minister a rejected lover, as well as the prec