'Yes--oh yes!' she replied; 'it is a beautiful countryside, and the longer I live in it the more I see in it to admire. A wooded locality, such as this, looks at its best--at least from an artist's standpoint--in the late autumn, when sufficient foliage is shed to allow the gray-purple of the branches to mingle with the yellow and russet of the leaves. I am fortunate in being here at this particular time, and I have made quite a number of sketches, which I may work up later. But I am not really an artist. I am only a humble amateur, though I may to an extent have the eye of an artist--to appreciate all the beautiful sights, you know, and that, after all, is something. But I must be going. Good-afternoon; and I'm glad that you are getting on so nicely.--Good-bye, Bang.--Good-bye, Jip;' and she gave them a parting pat, and with a smile on her face which I long remembered, she walked slowly away. It is a very slender hair to make a tether with, but somehow the fact of her remembering the dogs by name is a consoling thought, and a source of peculiar satisfaction to me. CHAPTER XI. When I got home, and was comfortably seated in my arm-chair by the fire, Betty came in to set my tea, and I wasn't long in noticing that, from her abstracted air and the listless way she was moving about, she had something on her mind. She looked for a moment or two at Bang and Jip lying comfortably curled up on the hearthrug. 'Thae dugs are braw an' snug lyin' there,' she said; 'an' my puir Jessie's sittin' in the cauld stick-hoose in the huff. No' that I grudge them their warm bed, for I'm gled--he'rt gled--to see them peaceable at last wi' yin anither. It's nae time since they were girnin' an' fechtin' an' tumblin' ower each ither frae the Cross to the Gill, an' noo, haith, they canna get ower cheek-for-chowie. Ye maun ha'e a wonderfu' wey wi' dugs, Maister Weelum. It's a peety ye couldna exert it in ither weys.' I know Betty too well to venture assistance, and I had the feeling that she would soon work her way round to her subject without my aiding and abetting. 'The kettle will soon be through the boil, an' ye'll get your tea in a jiffy,' she said. 'Imphm! it's a gey comfortable-lookin' chair, that yin opposite ye, Maister Weelum; an', d'ye ken, I met a leddy the day that I wad like to see sittin' in it.' 'Indeed, Betty!' 'Ay. I dinna ken when I was sae much impressed wi' onybody at first sicht as I was this day; an' when I was sittin' lookin' at her, an' listenin' to her voice, something whispered in my ear, "That's the wife for my boy."' 'My goodness, Betty, you're forcing the pace!' I laughingly said. 'First you wish to see this lady sitting in my chair, and in your next breath you say you wish to see her my wife! Where did you meet this paragon?'