as it might. At first,
as she slowly descended from the carriage, her large, dark, brilliant
eyes were fixed upon the ground. She had looked long at the house as she
was driving towards it, and it seemed to have cast her into a thoughtful
mood. It is hardly possible to enter a house where we have spent many
early years, without finding memory suddenly seize upon the heart and
possess it totally. What a grave it is! What a long line of buried
ancestors may not _the present_ always contemplate there.

Nor are there many received into the tomb worth so much respect as one
dead hour. All else shall live again; lost hours have no resurrection.

There were old servants waiting around, to welcome her, new ones
attending upon her orders; but for a moment or two she noticed no one,
till at length the old housekeeper, who knew her from a babe, spoke out,
saying, "Ah, madam! I do not wonder to see you a little sad on first
coming to the old place again, after all that has happened."

"Ah, indeed, Arnold," replied the lady, "many sad things have happened
since we parted. But how are you, Goody? You look blooming:" and walking
into the house, she heard the reply in the hall.

From the hall, the old housekeeper led her lady through the house, and
mightily did she chatter and gossip by the way. The lady listened nearly
in silence; for Mrs. Arnold was generous in conversation, and spared her
companion all expense of words. At length, however, something she said
seemed to rouse her mistress, and she exclaimed with a somewhat bitter
laugh, "And so the good people declared I was going to be married to Sir
Philip Hastings?"

"_Mr._ Hastings he was then, madam," answered the housekeeper; "to be
sure they did. All the country around talked of it, and the tenants
listened at church to hear the banns proclaimed."

The lady turned very red, and the old woman went on to say, "Old Sir
John seemed quite sure of it; but he reckoned without his host, I
fancy."

"He did indeed," said the lady with an uncheerful smile, and there the
subject dropped for the time. Not long after, however, the lady herself
brought the conversation back to nearly the same point, asked after Sir
Philip's health and manner of living, and how he was liked in the
neighborhood, adding, "He seemed a strange being at the time I saw him,
which was only once or twice--not likely to make a very pleasant
husband, I thought."

"Oh dear, yes, madam, he does," answered Mrs. Ar