resemble any thing you ever saw before."

"Its very novelty," said Isabella, "I have no doubt, will have a charm for me. And could you,” added she, casting a doubting eye on Mr. Willoughby, "could you have gone with me"-then, seeing denial in his face, she immediately changed the conclusion of the sentence into-" yet you will follow me so immediately I trust, that I will endeavour to think it the same thing."

"Oh! it will be quite so," returned Mr. Willoughby. "You may depend upon it I will join you as soon as possible; but I think I must have a few dips in the sea first; I feel quite relaxed; and I have some arrangements to make in Hertfordshire. If you should really take a fancy to Eagle's Crag, it might not be amiss to sell Beechwood; the place is expensive,

and if you are determined not to go to it, I see no good in keeping it."

"Surely, my dear Mr. Willoughby," said Isabella," in all such things you must determine for me. I am not aware that I ever did say I would not go again to Beechwood. Wherever you wish me to be, there I will be ; and whatever arrangements you may think right, I will acquiesce in with pleasure."

"Spoken like a prettily-behaved wife," said Mr. Willoughby, kissing her. "But, Isabella, you look grave. I do not love either to make, or to exact sacrifices. Let us each do as we like, and then we are sure to be pleased with each other; for I am confident that you will never like any thing that I could seriously disapprove, and I hope you can say as much for me."

"I hope I never gave you reason

to think otherwise," said Isabella, "nor ever shall."

Mr. Willoughby did not press for a more explicitly expressed confidence in the rectitude of his taste: he turned the current of the conversation, by asking, "when she thought she should be ready to leave London, and how long she intended to be in making her journey?" Isabella named a week as a sufficient time for any preparations that she had to make; and she referred to Mr. Willoughby, who knew the distance, and the rate of travelling, better than she did, as to the other particular.

All this being arranged between them, Mr. Willoughby promised to write to Roberts, fixing the day, later than which, nothing must be unfinished that would be necessary to the comfortable reception of Isabella at Eagle's Crag; and having so done, he quitted

her to follow his "own likings," in whatever direction they might lead him.

Isabella, left to herself, found from what had passed abundant cause for a variety of reflections, as new as they were unpleasant to her.

It was very evident that Mr. Willoughby would not be sorry for a pretence to get rid of his house in Hertfordshire; and it did not escape her that he contemplated without reluctance the possibility that she would fix herself wholly at Eagle's Crag. That her doing so, provided he could persuade himself that she preferred it to any other residence, would not be any restraint upon his more vagrant fancies; and though his natural generosity and indulgent temper made him urge her to deny herself nothing which she could desire to have, yet she could not forget that he had said, that he

"thought it nonsense to spend money upon what gave him no pleasure, when he had so many uses for it that did." His observation, on even the passing shadow on her countenance, told her that he would ill brook any interference in his own pursuits, and would hold himself little obliged to her for a prudence that reproached his want of it, or for any sacrifices exacted by his want of consideration. Nor could she fail to be struck by the incongruity between his first dissuasion from her going to Eagle's Crag at all, and the readiness with which he now accelerated her departure, and for a tarriance to which there did not appear to be, in his mind, any definite end.

These reflections took even a deeper tinge, when, two days afterwards, he returned to the subject, with

"I have been thinking, Isabella, that it will not be unadvisable to take