,' said Philip,--'earnest,
melancholy, beautiful! It would stir the feelings--were it an unknown
portrait. No, Amy, you need not be ashamed of your tears.'

But Amy turned away, doubly ashamed.

'I hope it is not in the ball-room,' said Guy.

'No said Laura, 'it is in the library.'

Charlotte, whose absence had become perceptible from the general
quietness, here ran up with two envelopes, which she put into Guy's
hands. One contained Lady Kilcoran's genuine card of invitation for Sir
Guy Morville, the other Charlotte had scribbled in haste for Mr. Bustle.

This put an end to all rationality. Guy rose with a growl and a roar,
and hunted her over half the field, till she was caught, and came back
out of breath and screaming, 'We never had such a haymaking!'

'So I think the haymakers will say!' answered her mother, rising to go
indoors. 'What ruin of haycocks!'

'Oh, I'll set all that to rights,' said Guy, seizing a hay-fork.

'Stop, stop, take care!' cried Charles. 'I don't want to be built up in
the rick, and by and by, when my disconsolate family have had all the
ponds dragged for me, Deloraine will be heard to complain that they give
him very odd animal food.'

'Who could resist such a piteous appeal!' said Guy, helping him to rise,
and conducting him to his wheeled chair. The others followed, and when,
shortly after, Laura looked out at her window, she saw Guy, with his
coat off, toiling like a real haymaker, to build up the cocks in all
their neat fairness and height, whistling meantime the 'Queen of the
May,' and now and then singing a line. She watched the old cowman come
up, touching his hat, and looking less cross than usual; she saw Guy's
ready greeting, and perceived they were comparing the forks and rakes,
the pooks and cocks of their counties; and, finally, she beheld her
father ride into the field, and Guy spring to meet him.

No one could have so returned to what was in effect a home, unless his
time had been properly spent; and, in fact, all that Mr. Edmonstone or
Philip could hear of him, was so satisfactory, that Philip pronounced
that the first stage of the trial had been passed irreproachably, and
Laura felt and looked delighted at this sanction to the high estimation
in which she held him.

His own account of himself to Mrs. Edmonstone would not have been
equally satisfactory if she had not had something else to check it with.
It was given by degrees, and at many different times, chiefly