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this. You didn’t, of course, think of bringing an evening dress to such an out-of-the-way place ?”

But Rosa had come from the wrong city to be caught napping in those matters, “Yes, I did,” said she. “One never knowa what may turn up.”

“Well done! Then off we go at seven.”

The evening drew on, and at dusk they started on foot, Rosa pulling up the edge of her skirt under her cloak out of the way of the dews, so that it formed a great wind-bag all round her, and carrying her satin shoes under her arm. Joshua would not let her wait till she got in-doors before changing them, as she proposed, but insisted on her performing that operation under a tree, so that they might enter as if they had not walked. He waa nervously formal about such trifles, while Rosa took the whole proceeding—walk, dressing, dinner, and all—as a pastime. To Joshua it was a serious step in life.

A more unexpected kind of person for a , curate's sister was never presented at a dinner. The surprise of Mrs. Fellmer was unconcesled. She had locked forward to a Dorcas, or Martha, or Rhoda at the outside, and a shade of misgiving crossed her face. It was possible that, had the young lady accompanied her brother to church, there would have been no dining at Narrobourne House that day.

Not so with the young widower, her son. He resembled a sleeper who had awaked in a summer noon expecting to find it only dawn. He conld scarcely heip stretching his arma and yawning in their faces, so strong was his sense of being suddenly aroused to an unforeseen thing. When they had sat down to table he at first talked to Rosa somewhat with the air of a ruler in the land; but the woman lurking in the acquaintance soon brought him to his level, and the girl from Brussels saw bim looking at her mouth, her