I shall infallibly take if I find you persevere in
keeping to this silly engagement. Your father's
disapproval is always a sufficient reason to
allege."

Ralph was annoyed at the receipt of these
letters, though he only smiled as he locked them
up in his desk.

"Dear old father! how he blusters! As to
my mother, she is reasonable when I talk to her.
Once give her a definite idea of what Ellinor's
fortune will be, and let her, if she chooses, cut
down her timber—a threat she has held over me
ever since I knew what a rocking-horse was, and
which I have known to be illegal these ten years
past—and she'll come round. I know better
than they do how Reginald has run up
postobits, and as for that vulgar high-born Lady
Maria they are all so full of, why, she is a
Flanders mare to my Ellinor, and has not a silver
penny to cross herself with, besides! I bide my
time, you dear good people!"

He did not think it necessary to reply to these
letters immediately, nor did he even allude to
their contents in his to Ellinor. Mr. Wilkins,
who had been very well satisfied with his own
letter to the young man, and had thought that it
must be equally agreeable to every one, was not
at all suspicious of any disapproval because the
fact of a distinct sanction on the part of Mr.
Ralph Corbet's friends to his engagement was
not communicated to him.

As for Ellinor, she trembled all over with
happiness. Such a summer for the blossoming of
flowers and ripening of fruit had not been known
for years: it seemed to her as if bountiful loving
Nature wanted to fill the cup of Ellinor's joy to
overflowing, and as if everything, animate and
inanimate, sympathised with her happiness. Her
father was well, and apparently content. Miss
Monro was very kind. Dixon's lameness was
quite gone off. Only Mr. Dunster came creeping
about the house, on pretence of business,
seeking out her father, and disturbing all his
leisure with his dust-coloured parchment-skinned
careworn face, and seeming to disturb the
smooth current of her daily life whenever she
saw him.

Ellinor made her appearance at the Hamley
assemblies, but with less éclat than either her
father or her lover expected. Her beauty and
natural grace were admired by those who could
discriminate; but to the greater number there
was (what they called) "a want of style"—
want of elegance there certainly was not, for
her figure was perfect, and though she moved
shyly, she moved well. Perhaps it was not a
good place for a correct appreciation of Miss
Wilkins; some of the old dowagers thought it a
piece of presumption for her to be there at all—
but the Lady Holster of the day (who
remembered her husband's quarrel with Mr. Wilkins,
and looked away whenever Ellinor came near)
resented this opinion. "Miss Wilkins is
descended from Sir Frank's family, one of the
oldest in the county; the objection might have

been made years ago to the father, but as he had
been received, she did not know why Miss
Wilkins was to be alluded to as out of her place."
Ellinor's greatest enjoyment in the evening was
to hear her father say, after all was over, and
they were driving home,

"Well, I thought my Nelly the prettiest girl
there, and I think I know some other people who
would have thought the same if they could have
spoken out."

"Thank you, papa," said Ellinor, squeezing
his hand, which she held. She thought he alluded
to the absent Ralph as the person who would
have agreed with him, had he had the opportunity
of seeing her; but no, he seldom thought much
of the absent, but had been rather flattered by
seeing Lord Hildebrand take up his glass for the
apparent purpose of watching Ellinor.

"Your pearls, too, were as handsome as any in
the room, child—but we must have them re-set;
the sprays are old-fashioned now. Let me have
them to-morrow to send up to Hancock."

"Papa, please, I had rather keep them as they
are—as mamma wore them."

He was touched in a minute.

"Very well, darling. God bless you for thinking
of it."

But he ordered her a set of sapphires instead,
for the next assembly.

These balls were not such as to intoxicate
Ellinor with success, and make her in love with
gaiety. Large parties came from the different
country-houses in the neighbourhood, and danced
with each other. When they had exhausted the
resources they brought with them, they had
generally a few dances to spare for the friends of
the same standing with whom they were the most
intimate. Ellinor, coming with her father, and
joining an old card-playing dowager, by way of a
chaperone—the said dowager being under old
business obligations to the firm of Wilkins and
Son, and apologising to all her acquaintances for
her own weak condescension to Mr. Wilkins's
foible in wishing to introduce his daughter into
society above her natural sphere. It was upon
this lady, after she had uttered some such speech
as this I have just mentioned, that Lady Holster
had come down with the pedigree of Ellinor's
mother. But though the old dowager had drawn
back, a little discomfited at my lady's reply, she
was not more attentive to Ellinor in consequence.
She allowed Mr. Wilkins to bring in his daughter
and place her on the crimson sofa beside her;
spoke to her occasionally in the interval that
elapsed before the rubbers could be properly
arranged in the card-room; invited the girl to
accompany her to that sober amusement, and on
Ellinor's declining, and preferring to remain with
her father, the dowager left her with a sweet
smile on her plump countenance, and an
approving conscience somewhere within her portly
frame, assuring her that she had done all that
could possibly have been expected from her
towards " that good Wilkins's daughter." Ellinor
stood by her father, watching the dances,