then she returned to her sleeping apartment, full of love, with a pretty, child-like expression beaming upon her motherly face.

She was awake when Harold and his sisters arrived home, at five o'clock. She distinctly heard them speaking in whispers when they passed the door of her room, and she thanked them in her heart for it, knowing that they murmured low to one another lest they might disturb her slumbers. "God bless ye!" she softly said, and closed her eyes, feeling within herself a sense of profound peace, such as the world never gave her and never could give.

In another hour, when stalwart labourers, smoking their first pipefuls, wended from humble dwellings to commence their early labour,—

"For men must work,

there's little to earn and many to keep,"

and the noise of carts rattling on the sun-dried roads indicated the birth of busy day and humanity's renewed struggle for subsistence, a figure closely veiled glided down the curved avenue, and passed unnoticed the lodge gates attached to the mansion of the Leyne family. This figure continued its rapid pace towards the entrance of a building where men and women were following one another, and disappearing through the door-way. The veiled figure entered with the rest, and, flinging her dark veil

aside, revealed the joyous face of Mary Leyne. She knelt side by side with these humble country-folk and hardy day-labourers; and no one in that modest little chapel was humbler or happier than this maiden, whom, a few hours ago, Honourables, and Right Honourables, and a stray Lord or Baronet danced with and listened to, as her gay laughter and winning words delighted them, and made them sigh when another claimant came and led her away to the whirling maze.

In the glad sky the sun was higher when Mary Leyne tripped lightly home again, rejoicing with the wild birds, this shining April morn, and hearing from afar the bugle-sounds summoning men to the battle of life, the imperious factory bells, the shrill warnings of impatient trains, the rising hum of the city, and, amidst such notes of strife, the quieter tone from a church-belfry, like the accents of a wise counsellor, bidding mankind not to forget.

A Newfoundland dog, lazily stretched in the sunshine across the hall-steps, bounded forward swiftly when he saw her approaching. She patted him, and he looked up gratefully; but she bade him make no disturbance; and he implicitly obeyed, with loving lustre in his big eyes. The blushing girl applied her latchkey noiselessly to the door, the dog's bushy tail wagging energetically all the while. When the door was opened, he would fain follow her in and be with

:

her she and he were such close friends from the days of his foolish puppyhood. If the dog could speak, he would tell many a tale of her solicitude for him at the breakfast and dinner hours. Many a tit-bit, many a crust and unpicked bone he had to thank her for with that energetic tail of his, and those glistening, wistful eyes! This morning, however, she told him he must not come in; and so she cautiously closed the door and left him to his dog-thoughts, in the genial enjoyment of the Spring sunshine, and hastening without being heard up-stairs to her bedroom, lay down and slept soundly, with the unutterable smile upon her face, no less sweetly expressive in her saint-like slumber than when, with the gladness of a holy heart, she lifted her veil in the little chapel and charmed by her loveliness the poor and lowly worshippers, who rejoiced to see her kneeling amongst them.

Oh! there are men and women living lives that are truly beautiful, in spite of the influence of those who would rob them of their precious treasure and set up instead, for universal worship, an idol of gold. In the midst of much delusion they are a reality. By those who are as themselves, they are rightly understood; to others, they may seem fools or enthusiasts. The passions, the hopes, the fears, the selfish ambitions that collect and storm in the little heart, drive no long-abiding clouds over the sunshine which beams so

fruitfully upon the narrow path they so confidingly tread. In the battle of human endeavour their blood courses cool, and to them is given the splendid victory! They are part of the glory of the great Creator; and old age does not make them regret a youth which, on this side of the grave, to none comes back again.

"All my fears are laid aside,

If I but remember only

Such as these have lived and died."

It was eleven o'clock before the Leynes greeted each other again; and at breakfast this was, after bidding her mother good morning, the first sentence uttered by Madeleine :

"We made a new acquaintance last night, mamma." "Who is the person, my dear?"

"One of Harold's particular friends."

"And, like him, a law student, mamma," Mary put in.

"Harold is bringing him out here to-day," Madeleine went on. "He wishes, we all wish, to introduce him to you. You will ardently admire him, mamma : he is just the sort that wins admiration, especially from such as you; he is so unlike many young men whom we meet every day, and who are such good-fornothing, stupid-headed fellows! I wonder at Harold, and am angry with him, for hiding this friend of his

so long from Mary and myself. During their college course they have been intimate friends, and yet he never brought him here."

"To fall in love with him, and break your heart if he did not care for you-a catastrophe not at all impossible," said Harold Leyne mischievously.

Madeleine pouted and drank her tea in silence, directing over her sparkling cup an angry and flashing eye at her brother, which made him laugh.

"You have not told me his name yet," Mrs. Leyne said, addressing her elder daughter.

"Noel d'Auvergne !" Mary exclaimed, in a clear, eager voice, before Madeleine could reply; and a blush, fresh and beautiful-one of the early roses of first love-brightened her face.