ry
differently I should do it!"

"Indeed, and in what respect?" said a voice behind his shoulder. He
looked up, and saw Beck Graham gazing on him with something of interest
in her expression. "How so?" cried she, again. Not in the slightest
degree discomposed or flurried, he lay lazily back on the sward, and
drawing his hand over his eyes to shade them from the sun, said, in
a half-languid, weary tone, "If it were to do again, I 'd go in for
happiness."

"What do you mean by happiness?"

"What we all mean by it: an organized selfishness, that draws a close
cordon round our home, and takes care to keep out, so far as possible,
duns, bores, fevers, and fashionable acquaintances. By the way, is your
visit ended, or will she see me?"

"Not to-day. She hopes to-morrow to be able. She asks if you are of the
Maitlands of Gillie--Gillie--not 'crankie,' but a sound like it,--and if
your mother's name was Janet."

"And I trust, from the little you know of me, you assured her it could
not be," said he, calmly.

"Well, I said that I knew no more of your family than all the rest of
us up at the Abbey, who have been sifting all the Maitlands in the three
kingdoms in the hope of finding you."

"How flattering! and at the same time how vain a labor! The name came to
me with some fortune. I took it as I 'd have taken a more ill-sounding
one for money! Who wouldn't be baptized in bank stock? I hope it's not
on the plea of my mother being Janet, that she consents to receive me?"

"She hopes you are Lady Janet's son, and that you have the Maitland
eyes, which it seems are dark, and a something in their manner which she
assures me was especially captivating."

"And for which, I trust, you vouched?"

"Yes. I said you were a clever sort of person, that could do a number
of things well, and that I for one did n't quarrel with your vanity or
conceit, but thought them rather good fun."

"So they are! and we 'll laugh at them together," said he, rising,
and preparing to set out "What a blessing to find one that really
understands me! I wish to heaven that you were not engaged!"

"And who says I am?" cried she, almost fiercely.

"Did I dream it? Who knows? The fact is, my dear Miss Becky, we do talk
with such a rare freedom to each other, it is pardonable to mix up one's
reveries with his actual information. How do you call that ruin yonder?"

"Dunluce."

"And that great bluff beyond it?"

"Fairhead."

"I 'll take a long wal