"I don't know," replied Hilda. "I like to see nice flowers and shrubs."

"I suppose your chief experience of gardens is confined to Regent's Park and Kensington Horticultural Gardens, to which, perhaps, may be added Covent Garden ?"

Something more than that. I know many beautiful private gardens, and I have been several times to Kew." "Ah! there I envy you. I never visited Kew. It is more than forty years since I was in London, and I am told it is wonderfully altered and extended. Well! I think I shall give over certain gardening duties into your hands. I want more help with the flowers."

"But I know literally nothing about them."

"Never too late to learn. By the way, how old are you, niece Hilda? Mr. Seeley did inform me, but I have forgotten. My memory, I am sorry to say, is becomingfor recent events, that is-terribly sieve-like."

"I was eighteen last birthday, ma'am."

"You may as well call me 'aunt'; 'grand-aunt' would, of course, be my proper appellation, but it sounds eccentric-though why not 'grand-aunt' equally with ‘grandmamma,' I do not know. Society is terribly inconsistent. And so you are eighteen? I thought you were about that age, though you look older. London life certainly does not conduce to a healthy appearance. Do you never have a colour?"

"I had plenty of colour till all the trouble came not many weeks ago."

"I thought you gay town misses danced all your bloom away under the gas-lights, night after night."

"I had plenty, and it was almost the end of the season, till-till-but if you please, Aunt Dorothy, I had rather not talk about myself.'

"Oneself is not often a profitable subject of conversation. Still, I should like to know a little about you. I will not touch upon anything painful, but I want to inquire whether you consider your education completed ? "

"Oh, yes; quite. I left school just a year ago."

"And what have you been doing with yourself ever since?—I mean generally; I am not asking for confidences."

"What other young ladies of my age do, I suppose. I went, first of all, to Brighton-both there and in London I went out a good deal-and I took lessons in singing and Italian. I was not supposed to be properly introduced' till the spring, when I was presented. After that, I must confess, it was one round of gaiety and amusement, and Aunt Mowbray and I were thinking of Biarritz or Bagnières de Bigorre when-when everything was altered."

"And were you happy, dancing, singing, and playing day after day ?"

66

Very happy! So happy that it seems now like a lovely dream. But please, I cannot talk about it."

"You shall not until you wish it. I have only one thing more to ask-What have you done for God since you ceased to be a school-girl, and came to woman's estate, a year ago ?

"I hardly know. I went to church, of course, on Sundays, and I always gave at collections, and subscribed to charities; and last Easter I worked myself nearly to death at a bazaar for some orphan institution. Perhaps you think I ought to have visited the poor? Some of my friends did, and some of them went to church every day of the week; but I was not brought up to be religious, and somehow, I do not think going continually to church would have made me better in myself."

"Is that your idea of being religious-going continually to church?

66 I suppose something more is wanted-a moral life, for instance-but really, Aunt Dorothy, I have never thought about it."

"Did you not think, when suddenly your dream of pleasure vanished, when troubles overwhelmed you, when friends forsook, and those in whom you trusted proved faithless and unkind?"

"How do you know that friends forsook? "

"It is the way of the world-of that world in which you lived, the gay and thoughtless, the frivolous and careless world, which lives for the passing hour alone. Mind, I do not mean to abuse the world at large. The world is a good world, for it is God's world, and whether

we will or not, He is its King and Ruler. I have no sympathy, and very little patience, with those good folks who are for ever making their moan about this miserable earth, this vale of tears, this howling wilderness! If the world is a wilderness-which, God knows, it is, in spite of nineteen centuries of Christianity-why not set to work to cultivate it? Dear me, if everybody who shakes his or her head at this wicked world would just take one little portion of it, the little bit about his own doors, and try under God's blessing to make it better, to fight against the devil, and for King Jesus, then I think the wilderness would blossom as the rose, and there would be gladness and singing even in the desert. It is a great thing to be permitted to do God's work in this world, and it must be sad indeed to go into His presence and have nothing to report but a selfish, wasted life. And remember, child, God can do without you, though you cannot do without Him. Hilda, let the experience of the last few weeks show you that out of God there is no happiness, no rest, no life even, that is worth the name. In Him are peace and joy, in His presence is fulness of joy, at His right hand are pleasures for evermore."

"But does not that refer to another life? Are not those pleasures to be found only in heaven?"

'Child, what have you to do with heaven? If you went there to-day, what could you do with yourself? You do not love heaven's King, you are not His servant. Don't you think you would soon get very tired of singing the Hallelujah Chorus ?"

"Yes," said Hilda, emphatically, "I have often thought I should. I am not like the good old German Frau, whose brightest anticipations of heaven were of sitting still, continually singing hymns, with folded hands, and a clean apron on. It is all very poetical about palms of glory, and white robes, and crowns and harps of gold, but

"Child," interrupted Mrs. Dorothy, solemnly and almost sternly, "the palms are for the victors, the white robes are for those who have washed them and made them white in the blood of the Lamb, the crowns are for them who have fought the good fight and kept the faith,

the harps are for the hands that learned how to tune them when they hung upon the willows. What victory have you won? What has your conquest been? What do you know of Christ, the King of Glory? What is the everlasting song to you? For, Hilda, the crown will never fit your brows till you have borne the cross, nor will the strings of the golden harps ever respond to the touch of one whose heart is attuned only to earthly melodies."

"Books are not seldom talismans and spells,
By which the magic art of shrewder wits
Holds an unthinking multitude enthralled.
Some to the fascination of a name

Surrender judgment hoodwink'd. Some the style
Infatuates, and through labyrinths and wilds

Of error leads them, by a tune entranced.
While sloth seduces more, too weak to bear

The insupportable fatigue of thought,

And swallowing, therefore, without pause or choice,
The total grist unsifted, husks and all."

Ir was drawing on to evening when Hilda suddenly remembered that she had neither heard nor seen anything of the Arnisons, with whom she was to associate as little as possible. "They may be tradespeople," thought Hilda to herself, "and yet be none the worse; and then, as Aunt Dorothy farms and sells pigs, I don't see how I can stand out on any question of position, if these unknown cousins should make kindly advances. I wonder if they are often here."

They had dined in the middle of the day, to Miss Capel's great surprise, and now Barker, who generally waited at table when there were no visitors, was bringing in the tea-tray. Mrs. Dorothy was turning down the

heel of a stocking with the utmost exactitude. She was very proud of her knitting, and scorned to wear hose not of her own manufacture. She was again handsomely attired in rich black silk; fine lace mittens were on her still shapely hands, and on her third finger glittered diamonds of no trifling value. The farmeress had given place once more to the lady of the manor, and with the resumption of her patrician aspect had returned also to the Quaker form of speech. Hilda herself sat by the window, making belief to be busy with a piece of muslin embroidery, commenced about a year ago, and no good specimen of her power as a needlewoman.

"It is growing dusk," said Mrs. Dorothy, presently. "Do not try thy eyes with that messy bit of stuff. I wonder why none of thy cousins have been here to-day! Thou knowest, doubtless, that thou hast cousins, living in the town yonder?"

"Yes; my Aunt Mowbray told me of them."

"And hadst thou never heard of them before?"

"To the best of my remembrance, never! I think I always knew I had some cousins somewhere, but I am sure I did not know their names."

"Thy mother and thy Aunt Mowbray never did approve of thy father's relations, but I cannot understand how they should let thee grow up to woman's estate without being cognisant of the name of thy kindred. The Arnisons are thy near relations; thy Aunt Rose is really nearer to thee than I am, for she is thy father's own sister, and her children are thy first cousins, who count next to sisters and brothers. However, thou wilt know them now, for they are generally backwards and forwards between this house and their own several times a day. I suppose they came not this day, because they thought thou mightest prefer to be undisturbed after thy long journey. They are good, considerate girls, thy cousins.'

"Are there many of them, Aunt Dorothy?"

"No less than eleven! the eldest-Alice-is almost two-and-twenty; the youngest-bonny little Jack-will be three one day next week. Irene ought to be thy chief friend, she was eighteen a little while ago; I forget when, only I remember the dear child's birthday always comes