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you must come and visit the garden at the Hall. The flowers and plants there are quite as much at your disposal, and I trust a little freer from melancholy association than the weeds you have been at the trouble of transplanting from a spot, to say the least of it, so unlucky as Warling Wood."

"Shut the door, Hetty!" cried the old man, tottering back into the cottage and sinking upon the settle, the moment his guest disappeared through the garden-gate into the lane. "Shut it after him, lest he should be tempted to return. Shut it, child, and bolt it!" continued he, with almost hysterical violence. And Esther could appreciate the restraint her uncle must have been exercising over himself in the stranger's presence, from the violence with which his emotions now burst forth.

Heavy sobs, broken by incoherent ejaculations, escaped his heaving breast.

"The wretch the ruffian!" cried he. "He to speak disrespectfully of my poor boy!

-He to triumph over Luke!-He to threaten!

-He to exult! And to be obliged to listen to him, Esther, and stand by without an angry word between my lips, while he was darting his looks into yours, and taking the measure of your shape with his hateful eyes. What would your cousin have said, Hetty, could he have seen him! And I said nothing! I uttered never a word!-Like a poor convicted wretch I sat by, prepared to meet with submission whatever insult he might be pleased to offer to me and mine!"

"Do not distress yourself in this way, uncle," pleaded the poor girl. "The gentleman, whoever he may be, spoke you fairly, and seemed to mean you no harm.”

"Means me no harm!" muttered poor Downing, with a haggard look.

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People who have undergone much trouble, get to look upon everybody as an enemy," persisted Esther.

"If you were acting this morning, my dear child, under orders from your poor cousin Luke," rejoined the old man, "you cannot but be aware that his anxiety of late has

arisen from the threatenings of a man who is bent upon bringing him to justice."

"Bringing him to justice?" interrupted Esther Harman, turning as pale as death.

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'No, uncle! I knew nothing of the kind; I guessed nothing of the kind. Since the poor fellow landed in America, he has written to me from time to time, telling me only that he was well and thriving; but never why he had quitted England, or whether he ever intended to return to it again. At first, indeed, I offered to join him, as soon as the labour of my own hands afforded me means for the voyage. For then I fancied him poor, and that my assistance and presence might be a comfort to him. But as soon as I found how much you had done for my cousin, and how greatly he was prospering, I ceased to make further plans or further offers, fancying that, after all, his trip to America had been a mere speculation-an affair of money-making, the unlooked-for success of which had perhaps made him look above me-perhaps forget me, -perhaps forget himself."

"Poor fellow! poor Luke!" murmured his father, in scarcely audible accents.

"And so I took what comfort I could, uncle, and determined to trouble him no more," added poor Esther, in a still more desponding voice; "though, in spite of all I could do, he was still uppermost in my thoughts,—that is, he was all my thoughts,-all my object,—all my very life,—he has been, God knows, ever since we were children together, threading daisies on the Norcroft meadows. I worked the less hard, indeed, from the time I knew it was all of no use; and that, hoard what earnings I might, they were never to take me to him! But a short while ago, there came a letter by post, not like the rest, sad, and short, and cold, but like a leave-taking letter, telling all-all that is in the heart, because there is no further use in concealment. In that letter, uncle, he explained why he had never asked me to join him, why he had ceased to remind me of my promise to be his wife; because, prosper as he might, a great peril was always suspended over him; and that

never, never would he expose me to the shame which might at any moment overtake him and darken his remaining days."

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Ay, at any moment-at any moment!" muttered the unhappy old man.

"He even told me the cause of all this trouble, uncle," added Esther, in a faint voice, "and very terrible was it to me to learn for truth what I had so often guessed and guessed till my heart ached again. But from all he said of his feelings and his reasons for abstaining from making me his wife, I determined instantly to set out for America and join him. The money I first collected is still untouched. For though I had given up all thoughts of the voyage, I should have taken shame to myself to have used a shilling of it for any other purpose."

"Poor girl!-Good girl!" moaned the father of Luke.

"And next week, uncle, I shall embark at Liverpool. You will not betray me to my brother? No, no, you will not betray me. Since my poor mother's death, I have not