looking back down the street.

"There

he is, talking to a knot of people at the market-hall-farmers, no doubt, whom he

will try to make Free-traders, and who would listen to him affectionately, even if he tried to make them Mahometans. The good soul! There isn't a better man in all Dorsetshire."

It was evident that Nathanael greatly liked "Duke Dugdale.”

Agatha would have asked a score of questions about his age, which defied all guessing, and might have been anything from thirty to fifty-five-also about his "Missus," for he looked like a man who never could have made love, or thought of such a thing, in all his life. But her curiosity was restrained, partly by that of the old servant behind, who kept up a close though reverential observance of all the sayings and doings of "Ma-a-ester" Nathanael's wife.

She did not like even accidentally to betray how very little of Kingcombe her reserved husband had told her, and how she knew scarcely more of his family than their names.

Having parted from his brother-in-law, and gradually lost the benign influence which Duke Dugdale seemed to impart, Mr. Harper's face re-assumed that gravity, almost sadness, which, except when talking with herself, his wife now continually saw it wear.

They drove on, pushing against a fierce wind, that appeared like an invisible iron barrier to intercept their way. Every now and then Agatha could not help shivering and creeping closer to her husband; whenever she did so, he always turned round and wrapped her up with most sedulous

care.

"It is a dreary day for you to see our county for the first time, Agatha. If the sun were shining, these wide bleak sweeps

of country would look all purple with heather, and that dun-coloured, gloomy range of hills-we must call them hills out of compliment, though they are so small-would stand out in a clear line against the sky. Beyond them lies the British Channel, with its grand sea-coast."

"The sea-ah! always the sea.

"Nay, dear, don't be afraid, now don't'ee -as we Dorset people would say," answered he, trying to make her smile. Kingcombe Holm lies in a valley. You would never know you were so near the ocean. the same at Anne Valery's house."

It is

"Where is that?" said Agatha, brighten

ing up at the mention of the name.

"Why, this animal seems inclined to show me—even if I did not know it of long habit," answered Mr. Harper, bestowing a little less of his attention on his wife, and more on the obstreperous pony, who, in regard to a cer

tain turn of the road, had grown peculiarly wrong-headed.

"Don't'ee give in, sir! T' Squire bought he o' Miss Valery, and she do gi 'un their own way, terrible bad," hinted the groom, with the peculiar Dorset fashion of ignoring accusative cases.

"Unfortunately, his own way happens to be a wrong one," said Nathanael, quietly, as he drew the reins tighter, and set himself to do that which it takes a very firm man to do-to conquer an obstinate and unruly horse. Agatha remembered what she had heard or read somewhere about such a case being no bad criterion of a man's character. "Lose your temper, and you'll lose your beast," ay, and perhaps your own life into the bargain. She was considerably frightened, but she sat quite still, looking from the struggling animal to her husband, in whose fair face the colour had risen, while the boyish

lips were set together with a will, fierce,

rigid, and man-like.

her

66

eyes from him.

She could hardly take

Agatha, are you afraid? Will you de

scend ?" asked he, suddenly.

"No-I will stay with you."

"Then I'll rule this creature. It is the right way, and he must go in it," said Nathanael, under his breath.

The struggle between man and brute lasted a minute or two longer, at the end of which, all danger being over, they were speeding on rapidly to Kingcombe Holm. Agatha sat very thoughtful.

"I fear," she said—when he tried to draw her out of her contemplative mood, showing her the wild furzy slopes and the fir-trees, almost the only trees that grow in this region -standing in black clumps on the hill-tops, like sentinel-ghosts of the old Romans, who