“Well, be content,” said Agatha, awaking from a reverie as to how many days her husband intended to stay at Kingcombe Holm, whither they were this week going on a formal invitation, and whether the new house would be quite ready on their return--“Be content, Emma; I really did not catch the name.” “I'm glad of it,” said the gossiping little woman--though she looked extremely sorry. “Of course, if Major Harper had known--why, you would have heard.” “Heard what” asked Agatha, her curiosity at last attracted by her brother-in-law's name. But now Emma seemed wilfully bent upon maintaining a mysterious silence. “That's exactly what I can't tell you, my dear, except thus much--that my husband is afraid Major Harper has been losing a good deal of money, since more than two-thirds of the shares in Wheal Caroline were in his name, and now the vein has failed--that is, if ever there was a vein or a mine at all--and the other shareholders declare there has been a great deal of cheating somewhere--and--you understand.” Agatha did not understand one jot. All she drew from this confused volubility was the fact that Major Harper had somehow lost money, for which she was very sorry. But to her utter ignorance of financial or business matters the term “losing money” bore very little meaning. However, she recurred with satisfaction to her own reputed wealth, and thought if Major Harper were in any need he would of course tell his brother, and she and Nathanael could at once supply what he wanted. She determined to speak to her husband the first opportunity, and so dismissed the subject, as being not half so interesting as that of “the new house.” At the gate of this the two ladies now stood, and Emma, with a matronly importance, introduced the gratified young wife to all its perfections. If there be one instinct that lurks in a woman's breast, ready to spring up when touched, and bloom into all sorts of beautiful and happy feelings, it is the sense of home--of pleasant domestic sway and domestic comfort--the looking forward to “a house of one's own.” Many ordinary girls marry for nothing but this; and in the nobler half of their sex even amidst the strongest and most romantic personal attachment there is a something--a vague, dear hope, that, flying beyond the lover and the bridegroom, nestles itself in the husband and the future home.--The home as well as the husband, since it is given by him, is loved for his sake, and made beautiful for his comfort, while he is the ruler, the guide, and the centre of all.