thinking himself unobserved, Partridge worshipped her with his eyes in a perfect ecstasy. She, in return, spoke to him through the harmonium, although the congregation knew it not. But he did not call at the house or seek her out in any way, and she gradually came to the conclusion that he was waiting to win his spurs before laying his heart at her feet. Without a word from her, Old Man Sewell must have arrived at the same conclusion, for he passed round a hint that the stranger was to be helped and instructed in every possible way, and that any one molesting him would have to render a detailed account for so doing.

One day Mr. Partridge met Elena on the sidewalk, and stood aside, hat in hand, to let her pass. Their eyes glowed as she thanked him sweetly. For the next hundred yards, Elena underwent the severest struggle of her life. She wanted to look back and see him again. Mercifully, she had to make a half-turn to go up the post-office steps, and, in so doing, saw something which brought another blush to her face. Mr. Partridge was standing exactly where she had left him, gazing at the imprint of her pretty feet in the dust, whilst his unheeded horse strolled round the village looking up a few friends in the neighbouring sheds. Elena was forced to stay in the post office for fully ten minutes before he moved. She could almost hear him sigh as he suddenly became aware that his horse had disappeared, and started off in reluctant pursuit.

"Seems some sort of animal has took to our orchard at nights," Mr. Sewell drily remarked that evening. "It comes rustlin' round about ten o'clock under your winder.

Reckon I'd better keep the gun handy and blaze away at it. Maybe it's a bear from t'other side of the river. They hankers powerfully arter pork, and I ain't so blamed fond of 'em as to feed permiskuous bears, anyway."

Elena said nothing, for the twinkle in her father's eye showed that he knew all about the mysterious marauder. Still, she deemed it safer to take certain measures; and Mr. Sewell, before going to bed that evening, tested his gun with the ramrod. As he expected, he found that some one had been tampering with the charge, and grinned with fatherly toleration. "Reckon they've got it pretty

bad," he said to the old gun. "I wouldn't give much for Dick Higginson's chances. No, sir."

It was the Carberry picnic which brought matters to a climax. Mr. Partridge had been invited by a deputation of village maidens to join in the picnic, but, with his customary bashfulness, declined. Afterwards, when he heard that Elena was to be one of the party, he could have kicked himself for his stupidity. All day long he pondered over it, mixed matters up generally, nearly cut his finger off with a chaff-cutter, and was kicked in the stomach by his irascible old buggy horse, who had been without food for twice the proper time, and resented his master's absent-mindedness in the most forcible way possible. The stock, too, went astray, and had to be hunted up in the mosquito-infested bush ; the cows declined to yield their milk without more than the usual effort on his part; and Mr. Partridge, weary and worn out with the labours of the day, suddenly came to a desperate resolution. He would meet the picnickers on their way back. Was there not one bewitching suit of summer clothing, still unworn, which reposed in the bottom of his trunk ? He had saved it up for some crisis in his life, and felt that the crisis had arrived.

After supper he hastily effaced all marks of toil, and arrayed himself in the new suit. He also put on some patent leather boots which would have melted a heart of stone; his salmon-pink tie was a dream of loveliness; and his neat, active little figure looked well in its pearl-grey clothes. On examining his hands, he came to the conclusion that gloves would be superfluous; they were just the right mahogany colour for dogskin.

"What this house wants," he said resolutely, as he slammed the door, and carefully picked his way down the path, "is a mistress; and a mistress it shall have before I'm a year older, or I'll go back to London City and waste the rest of my life in a bank instead of becoming a man in this glorious country."

A mosquito alighted on his nose, and somewhat modified his enthusiasm as he strode along the Carberry Road through the faint moonlight. The dense Bush came up to within three or four yards of each side of the road, and the light which filtered through the overarching

boughs cast a chequered pattern on the dusty highway. Occasionally a blundering night-moth brushed against his mosquitoinflamed nose, and made him say things; but, for the most part, he went on wrapped in the glory of love's young dream, and wondering how he could possibly ever have the courage to make known the state of his affections to Miss Sewell.

When about half-way to Carberry he heard the merry voices of the picnickers as they slowly ascended the hill, singing in the moonlight. Most of them had got out of the buggies, and were walking in order to ease the tired horses. What should he say to them--how account for his presence there? In the solitude of his own home, it had all seemed so easy and natural. They would laugh at him, quiz him, pass him by on the other side. In another moment they would be round the corner, and see him standing there like a clumsy fool, with his mouth open. What could he do with his hands? Why had he forgotten to bring a stick? Why- Ah-h!

Suddenly, a small puppy gambolled across the road. The poor little thing was evidently lost. If he could pick it up and play with it, the situation was saved. Nothing more easy and natural in the world than to say, "Just found this

little pup. Isn't it jolly? Would you

like to have it, Miss Sewell ?” The picnickers would gather round, play with the pup, she would smile on him, and then perhaps he would find himself alone with her, and after that-Elysium!"

He hastily rushed towards the puppy, caught it, and walked forward as the picnickers turned the corner.

There was a sudden shriek of horrormore shrieks; every one got out of his way-behind trees; a sickening smell polluted the summer air! It was not musk, and yet it had a flavour of over-ripe musk, or cheese suffering from senile decay; it was not assafoetida, and yet it smelt nastier. It was more like the old chronicler's verse about Cologne, wherein he describes that ancient city as having

"Forty well-defined and separate stinks." Only, in this instance, there appeared to be four thousand; and they all emanated from the little animal struggling in Partridge's arms.

"Put it down! Put it down!" cried

Elena's anguished voice from behind a "It's-a-young skunk!"

tree.

In the midst of his anguish Partridge carried the loathsome little beast as far away as possible from Elena before letting it go, although every second's contact with it made matters worse for himself. When it had resentfully disappeared in the undergrowth, leaving intensely malodorous memories behind, every one climbed into the buggies and said nasty things to Partridge, who remained dumbfounded in the middle of the road.

"Whip up the horses and get out of this," said one girl, "or we shall all be sick." "Leave the fool to his folly," said another girl, "since he's so fond of skunks." "Spoiled his pretty clothes, too--he-he!" said Mr. Higginson, with a cheerful grin, as they drove off.

Only Elena remained silent: there were tears in her eyes. When the last buggy had turned the corner, Partridge lay down in the middle of the road and rolled in the dust. Perhaps that would rid him of this penetrating effluvium. Now he understood how even Civilisation itself is sometimes powerless before the forces of Nature. And, oh, how he mourned for his lost opportunity! The healing influence of the night, cool dews, soft winds, could not lessen his pain, could not make him clean. What should he do? What could he do?

He

Let

He was about to give himself another roll in the dust, when the rattle of returning buggy wheels caught his ear. This was a way out of the difficulty. sat up in the middle of the road. the wheels of his rival's chariot ride over him and crush him in the dust. It was better that it should be so. He was unclean! unclean! Unclean as any leper with his melancholy bell to warn the passers by. Unclean! He groaned and rolled again in the dust. The horse's feet were coming nearer and nearer still. In a minute more he would be crushed beneath them, and all would be well. He threw himself flat on his face, with a smothered groan of "Elena! Elena !" and waited for the end.

The horse was pulled up, and Elena's voice, full of pitying sweetness, broke upon his ear. "Is that you, Mr. Partridge?"

"I don't know," he groaned, and rose to his knees, then wildly waved her off. "Go away," he said. "Oh, please go away! Leave me to my misery."

The girl had a handkerchief tied round her nostrils, and her voice was muffled, "Can you hear me?" she asked, somewhat indistinctly.

He said he could; that at one time he had hoped to hear her for ever, but that now he could never dare to come near her again.

"Listen to me," she said, with a tremor in her voice. "Listen to me, and do as I tell you."

He declared that he wanted to die, and that his only object in living a moment longer was to please her.

"Very well, then," she said decisively, for all the muffling handkerchief. "Now I know that, I'm glad I wasn't prim."

She threw a small package into the road near him. "That's soap. Pick it up." He picked it up.

"About a hundred yards through the Bush there is the river. Take the soap

down there, strip in the Bush, and leave all your clothes there-everything, mind," she added; and blushed behind the handkerchief. "Shoes, socks-everything!" "But

"Get into the river, and-use the soap -all of it. Then come out at least two hundred yards higher up. You will find a suit of dad's clothes there, and you will be all right."

"You are an angel from heaven!" He clutched the soap. "An angel from heaven. When-when shall I see you again?"

"I-I will wait a quarter of a mile higher up."

She turned the horse round, and drove rapidly away, waving her hand encouragingly as she did so.

Partridge tore like a madman down the bank, still clutching his precious packet of soap. Should anything happen to that, he would be doubly lost. Once his footing failed him, and he rolled onwards; but, in the midst of the uncertainty as to where he was to bring up, he never let go of the soap. The one predominant idea in his mind was that soap meant salvation-bodily and mental.

At length he reached the edge of the trees, and saw the brown waters of the Ottawa glistening in the placid moonlight. He threw the soap on the sandy shore,

stripped off his things, flung them far into the Bush, walked nudely through the moonlight to the rippling flood, plunged into its cool waters, dived deep and long until he almost broke a bloodvessel, swam in a semicircle, then returned to the shore, soaped himself with renewed fervour, broke into the water again, came back, soaped himself once more, rolled in the sand, and took a final plunge, wading along higher up until he saw a bundle of garments on a rock and a big towel.

Joy! The taint had gone; he was once more clean.

Ten minutes later, Elena, patiently waiting on the high road, saw a diminutive figure crawl slowly towards her, clad in a voluminous mass of clothes. It dawned upon her that her father was six feet four in height, and that Mr. Partridge had found it necessary to double up the trouser legs until they nearly reached his waist. His coat tails dragged in the dust, his baggy waistcoat hung to his knees, and his bare pink toes (she had not thought of bringing either shoes or socks in her wild excitement) left a little pattern on the road. But in spite of this ridiculous costume, there was a light in his eyes which thrilled her with delight.

"I can never thank you enough," he said, pausing by the side of the buggy. All his shyness had gone. "May I sit beside you? The-the aroma has vanished." "Yes," she said slowly. "The others wanted me not to come. They said it wouldn't be proper-that I'd better stay prim, and leave you alone. But now

"Now?" He swung himself up on the buggy, without a thought of his precarious costume.

"Now," she said, turning towards him the light of her glorious eyes, “I'm glad— oh! how glad-I wasn't prim. Sit down, and I will drive you home."

He stood still on the buggy wheel. "I will sit beside you if I may sit beside you for ever," he said quietly. "I love you, dear heart! "I love you! May I—get in?”

"Ye-es," she said, almost inaudibly ; their lips met; and they drove on through the moonlight.

could not enter into them. And yet While the train followed its course through slumbering villages and farm lands, a sharp pain awoke in the girl's breast, and she grew weary of the skies. Little by little each word and look and gesture of the scene with Federan repeated itself in her memory, and as one gradually comes back to the roughness and loudness of life after an anesthetic, the whole discussion-its significance, its brutality, its violent contradictions of all her dreams, and its irremediable bitterness—seemed to break her spirit. Tears like rain fell down her cheeks; she rocked to and fro— as she had once seen a pleasant woman crying and rocking herself beside the dead body of a man. It seemed as though grief and all the emotions she had once thought sacred and individual took root in the very muscles, and had to obey some law in the great mechanism of the universe. Federan had felt the humiliation of a quarrel; she now felt the humiliation of suffering visibly the mental agitation which she wished to bear in silence and as a secret thing never to be disclosed. But when uncontrollable grief takes possession of a strong soul it comes almost as a child that must be indulged and compassionately treated; the Jennie that wept and swayed and moaned seemed a younger sister to the hidden, heartbroken Jennie who tried to wonder why tears had to be shed. At last her body grew obedient; she dried her smarting eyes, and, when the train stopped at Franton, the strain of the sea and the strong breeze lifted her thoughts to the freer atmosphere of everlasting things. Perhaps her heartache was trivial, but it hurt. Perhaps her love-story was a small matter, but if the world went on just the same in spite of it, she could not. The everlasting things were for the old; alas! she wanted the ephemeral elusive gladness one snatched while young from flying hours and days.

Rachel's maid was waiting in the avenue which led to Franton Manor.

She aped her mistress as well as she could, and she offered a perpetual caricature of Rachel; her tousled hair was carefully disordered with the intention of following the Récamier coiffure; she wore, without Rachel's grace, one of Rachel's dresses, dyed, but not altered; she had caught some of the inflexions of Rachel's voice, and assimilated her vocabulary.

On catching sight of Jennie, for whom she was watching, she wrung her hands almost as elegantly as Rachel herself might have made the gesture.

"Oh, I am too alarmed! Last night she was sad, but calm. And how quiet she was this morning! I feared that quiet for she has turned against her medicines and her massage; she calls them cowardice, and she says she is paying for the poisons which her ancestors for a hundred years drank, inhaled, and injected under the skin. She is raging. The moment you had left the house-and some one was mad enough to tell her you had gone-she sent notes to Mrs. Gillespie and Mrs. Howland. Then she fell into a swoon-not one of her swoons, but a regular swoon!" Here, never having seen her model in circumstances of real earnestness, the maid became natural, threw her apron, a piece of frilled muslin, over her head, and wailed out in her native dialect at the top of her resonant voice: "Don't say she's going to die! I dreamed three nights of white horses! They say she's ill enough to be prayed for. She must be dying if they pray for her in church. It's the last thing they do, miss. And only yesterday she gave me that rich blue evening-all passementerie. Oh, those white horses! I'll never forget them as long as I live. Their tails swept the ground, and the fair man in my dream who was driving them said, 'They eat cake, bless you!' It was all rubbish like that, and I woke up thinking, 'I don't like the looks of the fair man.' I was bitter cold, too!" She sobbed as she walked along with Jennie to the house, and said presently, after a violent shudder of unfeigned grief: "The passementerie is such a mass of beads that it will never dye black, or go with first mourning!"

Rachel, meanwhile, was in the rosegarden, reclining on a bench by the pond in the centre, where a stone cupid, pouring water from a cornucopia into a blue-tiled basin, sat astride on a stone dolphin. She loved the spot, for she had walked there on Federan's arm, and this association with him and with high and noble ideas rested like a caress on her memory. Mrs. Gillespie, Mrs. Howland, Mrs. BouverieCopeland and Mrs. Puddifant sat on chairs by her side. Their commonplace appearance ruined the picture, and they seemed like actresses in ulsters rehearsing their words in some elaborate stage scene.