ound
her picking peas in the garden. Having achieved his honours he relaxed
in the ardour of his studies, and his judgment and tastes also perhaps
became cooler. The sunshine of the pea-garden faded away from Miss
Martha, and poor Bell found himself engaged--and his hand pledged
to that bond in a thousand letters--to a coarse, ill-tempered,
ill-favoured, ill-mannered, middle-aged woman.

It was in consequence of one of many altercations (in which Martha's
eloquence shone, and in which therefore she was frequently pleased to
indulge) that Francis refused to take his pupils to Bearleader's Green,
where Mr. Coacher's living was, and where Bell was in the habit of
spending the summer: and he bethought him that he would pass the
vacation at his aunt's village, which he had not seen for many
years--not since little Helen was a girl and used to sit on his knee.
Down then he came and lived with them. Helen was grown a beautiful young
woman now. The cousins were nearly four months together, from June to
October. They walked in the summer evenings: they met in the early morn.
They read out of the same book when the old lady dozed at night over the
candles. What little Helen knew, Frank taught her. She sang to him: she
gave her artless heart to him. She was aware of all his story. Had he
made any secret?--had he not shown the picture of the woman to whom
he was engaged, and with a blush,--her letters, hard, eager, and
cruel?--The days went on and on, happier and closer, with more kindness,
more confidence, and more pity. At last one morning in October came,
when Francis went back to college, and the poor girl felt that her
tender heart was gone with him.

Frank too wakened up from the delightful midsummer dream to the horrible
reality of his own pain. He gnashed and tore at the chain which bound
him. He was frantic to break it and be free. Should he confess?--give
his savings to the woman to whom he was bound, and beg his
release?--there was time yet--he temporised. No living might fall in for
years to come. The cousins went on corresponding sadly and fondly: the
betrothed woman, hard, jealous, and dissatisfied, complaining bitterly,
and with reason, of her Francis's altered tone.

At last things came to a crisis, and the new attachment was discovered.
Francis owned it, cared not to disguise it, rebuked Martha with her
violent temper and angry imperiousness, and, worst of all, with her
inferiority and her age.

Her reply was,