lord. If you will follow me, I will be your guide here; the path is very slippery, and you must take care how you go."

66

'When I fall, it shall be at your feet," said he, with his hand on his heart.

As they gained the bottom of the little ravine down which the footpath lay, they found Julia, hoe in hand, at work in the garden before the door. Her dark woollen dress and her straw hat were only relieved in colour by a blue ribbon round her throat, but she was slightly flushed by exercise, and a little flurried perhaps by the surprise of seeing them, and her beauty, this time, certainly lacked nothing of that brilliancy which Lord Culduff had pronounced it deficient in.

My brother will be so sorry to have missed you, my lord," said she, leading the way into the little drawing-room, where, amidst many signs of narrow fortune, there were two or three of those indications which vouch for cultivated tastes and pleasures.

"I had told Lord Culduff so much about your cottage, Julia," said Marion, "that he insisted on coming to see it, without even apprising you of his intention."

"It is just as well," said she artlessly. gives the only change in its appearance.

looks nearly every day."

"A little more or less sun Lord Culduff sees it now as it

"And very charming that is," said he, walking to the window and looking out; and then he asked the name of a headland, and how a small rocky island was called, and on which side lay the village of Portshandon, and at what distance was the church, the replies to which seemed to afford him unmixed satisfaction, for as he resumed his seat he muttered several times to himself, "Very delightful indeed; very pleasing in every way."

"Lord Culduff was asking me, as he came along," said Marion, "whether I thought the solitude-I think he called it the savagery of this spot-was likely to be better borne by one native to such wildness, or by one so graced and gifted as yourself, and I protest he puzzled me."

"I used to think it very lonely, when I came here first, but I believe I should be sorry to leave it now," said Julia calmly.

"There, my lord," said Marion, "you are to pick your answer out of that."

"As to those resources, which you are so flattering as to call my gifts and graces," said Julia, laughing, "such of them at least as lighten the solitude were all learned here. I never took to gardening before; I Lever fed poultry."

"Oh, Julia! have mercy on our illusions."

"You must tell me what they are, before I can spare them. The curate's sister has no claim to be thought an enchanted princess."

"It is all enchantment!" said Lord Culduff, who had only very imperfectly caught what she said.

"Then I suppose, my lord," said Marion, haughtily, "I ought to rescue you before the spell is complete, as I came here in quality of guide."

And she rose as she spoke. "The piano has not been opened to-day, Julia. I take it you seldom sing of a morning."

"Very seldom indeed."

"So I told Lord Culduff; but I promised him his recompence in the evening. You are coming to us to-morrow, ain't you?"

"I fear not. I think George made our excuses. Mr. Longworth and a French friend of his here with us.”

We are to have

"You see, my lord, what a gay neighbourhood we have; here is a rival dinner-party," said Marion.

"There's no question of a dinner, they come to tea, I assure you," said Julia, laughing.

"No, my lord, it's useless, quite hopeless. I assure you she'll not sing for you of a morning." This speech was addressed to Lord Culduff, as he was turning over some music-books on the piano. :

"Have I your permission to look at these?" said he to Julia, as he opened a book of drawings in water-colours.

"Of course, my lord. They are mere sketches taken in the neighbourhood here, and as you will see, very hurriedly done."

"And have you such coast scenery as this?" asked he, in some astonishment, while he held up a rocky headland of several hundred feet, out of the caves at whose base a tumultuous sea was tumbling.

"I could show you finer and bolder bits than even that."

"Do you hear, my lord?" said Marion, in a low tone, only audible to himself."The fair Julia is offering to be your guide. I'm afraid it is growing late. One does forget time at this cottage. It was only the last day I came here I got scolded for being late at dinner."

And now ensued one of those little bustling scenes of shawling and embracing with which young ladies separate. They talked together, and laughed, and kissed, and answered half-uttered sentences, and even seemed after parting to have something more to say; they were by turns sad, and playful, and saucy-all of these moods being duly accompanied by graceful action, and a chance display of a hand or foot, as it might be, and then they parted.

"Well, my lord," said Marion, as they ascended the steep path that led homewards, "what do you say now? Is Julia as cold and impassive as you pronounced her, or are you ungrateful enough to ignore fascinations. all displayed and developed for your own especial captivation?" "It was very pretty coquetry, all of it," said he, smiling. lashes are even longer than I thought them."

"Her eye

"I saw that you remarked them, and she was gracious enough to remain looking at the drawing sufficiently long to allow you full time for the enjoyment."

The steep and rugged paths were quite as much as Lord Culduff could manage without talking, and he toiled along after her in silence, till they gained the beach.

"At last a bit of even ground," exclaimed he, with a sigh.

"You'll think nothing of the hill, my lord, when you've come it three or four times," said she, with a malicious twinkle of the eye.

"Which is precisely what I have no intention of doing."

"What! not cultivate the acquaintance so auspiciously opened?" "Not at this price," said he, looking at his splashed boots.

"And that excursion, that ramble, or whatever be the name for it, you were to take together?"

"It is a bliss, I am afraid, I must deny myself."

"You are wrong, my lord; very wrong. My brothers at least assure me that Julia is charming en tête-à-tête. Indeed, Augustus says one does not know her at all till you have passed an hour or two in such confidential intimacy. He says 'she comes out'—whatever that may be-wonderfully. "Oh, she comes out, does she?" said he, caressing his whiskers.

"That was his phrase for it. I take it to mean that she ventures to talk with a freedom more common on the Continent than in these islands. Is that coming out, my lord?"

"Well, I half suspect it is," said he, smiling faintly.

"And I suppose men like that?"

"I'm afraid, my dear Miss Bramleigh," said he, with a mock air of deploring; "I'm afraid that in these degenerate days men are very prone to like whatever gives them least trouble in everything, and if a woman will condescend to talk to us on our own topics, and treat them pretty much in our own way, we like it, simply because it diminishes the distance between us, and saves us that uphill clamber we are obliged to take when you insist upon our scrambling up to the high level you live in."

"It is somewhat of an ignoble confession you have made there," said she, haughtily.

lip.

"I know it-I feel it-I deplore it," said he, affectedly.

"If men will, out of mere indolence-no matter," said she, biting her "I'll not say what I was going to say."

66

Pray do. I beseech you finish what you have so well begun." "Were I to do so, my lord," said she, gravely, "it might finish more than that. It might at least go some way towards finishing our acquaintanceship. I'm sorely afraid you'd not have forgiven me had you heard me out."

"I'd never have forgiven myself, if I were the cause of it."

For some time they walked along in silence, and now the great house came into view-its windows all glowing and glittering in the blaze of a setting sun, while a faint breeze lazily moved the heavy folds of the enɔrmous flag that floated over the high tower.

"The

"I call that a very princely place," said he, stopping to admire it. "What a caprice to have built it in such a spot," said she. country people were not far wrong when they called it Bishop's Folly." "They gave it that name, did they?

"Yes, my lord. It is one of the ways in which humble folk reconcile themselves to lowly fortune; they ridicule their betters." And now she

gave a little low laugh to herself, as if some unuttered notion had just amused her.

"What made you smile?" asked he.

"A very absurd fancy struck me."

"Let me hear it. Why not let me share in its oddity?"

"It might not amuse you as much as it amused me."

"I am the only one who can decide that point."
"Then I'm not so certain it might not annoy you."

“I can assure you on that head," said he gallantly.

"Well, then, you shall hear it. The caprice of a great divine has, so to say, registered itself yonder, and will live, so long as stone and mortar endure, as Bishop's Folly; and I was thinking how strange it would be if another caprice just as unaccountable were to give a name to a less pretentious edifice, and a certain charming cottage be known to posterity as the Viscount's Folly. You're not angry with me, are you?"

"I'd be very angry indeed with you, with myself, and with the whole world, if I thought such a casualty a possibility."

"I assure you, when I said it I didn't believe it, my lord," said she, looking at him with much graciousness; "and, indeed, I would never have uttered the impertinence if you had not forced me. There, there goes the first bell; we shall have short time to dress,"-and with a very meaning smile and a familiar gesture of her hand, she tripped up the steps and disappeared.

"I think I'm all right in that quarter," was his lordship's reflection as he mounted the stairs to his room.

CHAPTER XII.

AN EVENING BELOW AND ABOVE STAIRS.

It was not very willingly that Mr. Cutbill left the drawing-room, where he had been performing a violoncello accompaniment to one of the young ladies in the execution of something very Mendelssohnian and profoundly puzzling to the uninitiated in harmonics. After the peerage, he loved counter-point; and it was really hard to tear himself away from passages of almost piercing shrillness, or those more still suggestive moanings of a double bass, to talk stock and share list with Colonel Bramleigh in the library. Resisting all the assurances that "papa wouldn't mind it; that any other time would do quite as well," and such like, he went up to his room for his books and papers, and then repaired to his rendezvous.

"I'm sorry to take you away from the drawing-room, Mr. Cutbill," said Bramleigh, as he entered, "but I am half expecting a summons to town, and could not exactly be sure of an opportunity to talk over this matter on which Lord Culduff is very urgent to have my opinion."

"It is not easy, I confess, to tear oneself away from such society. Your daughters are charming musicians, colonel. Miss Bramleigh's style

is as brilliant as Meyer's; and Miss Eleanor has a delicacy of touch I have never heard surpassed."

"This is very flattering, coming from so consummate a judge as yourself."

"All the teaching in the world will not impart that sensitive organization which sends some tones into the heart like the drip, drip of water on a heated brow. Oh, dear! music is too much for me; it totally subverts all my sentiments. I'm not fit for business after it, Colonel Bramleigh, that's the fact."

"Take a glass of that 'Bra Mouton.' You will find it good. It has been eight-and-thirty years in my cellar, and I never think of bringing it out except for a conncisseur in wine."

?"

"Nectar, positively nectar," said he, smacking his lips. "You are quite right not to give this to the public. They would drink it like a mere full-bodied Bordeaux. That velvety softness, that subdued strength, faintly recalling Burgundy, and that delicious bouquet, would all be clean thrown away on most people. I declare, I believe a refined palate is just as rare as a correct ear; don't you think so "I'm glad you like the wine. Don't spare it. The cellar is not far off. Now then, let us see. These papers contain Mr. Stebbing's report. I have only glanced my eye over it, but it seems like every other report. They have, I think, a stereotyped formula for these things. They all set out with their bit of geological learning; but you know, Mr. Cutbill, far better than I can tell you, you know sandstone doesn't always mean coal ?"

"If it doesn't, it ought to," said Cutbill, with a laugh, for the wine made him jolly, and familiar besides.

"There are many things in this world which ought to be, but which, unhappily, are not," said Bramleigh, in a tone evidently meant to be halfreproachful." And as I have already observed to you, mere geological formation is not sufficient. We want the mineral, sir; we want the fact." "There you have it; there it is for you," said Cutbill, pointing to a somewhat bulky parcel in brown paper in the centre of the table.

"This is not real coal, Mr. Cutbill," said Bramleigh, as he tore open the covering, and exposed a black mis-shapen lump. "You would not call this real coal ?"

"I'd not call it Swansea nor Cardiff, colonel, any more than I'd say the claret we had after dinner to-day was 'Mouton;' but still I'd call each of them very good in their way."

"I return you my thanks, sir, in name of my wine-merchant. But to come to the coal question,-what could you do with this?"

"What could I do with it? Scores of things,-if I had only enough of it. Burn it in grates-cook with it--smelt metals with it-burn lime with it-drive engines, not locomotives but stationaries, with it. I tell you what, Colonel Bramleigh," said he, with the air of a man who was asserting what he would not suffer to be gainsayed. "It's coal, quite