‘How full the river is just now; and so brown and strong! Dr. Langstroth says he remembers the river longer than anything else; and he says that Tees is as broad as Bradstane is long. Isn’t that queer?’ Eleanor laughed. It is an indubitable fact, and one which she had herself noted with amusement during the first part of her stay in Bradstane, that in a town like this, or, indeed, in any small town or village situated upon a stream as big as the Tees, ‘the river’ becomes the important feature of the neighbourhood. What it looks like, whether it be high or low; in winter, whether the river be frozen or flowing; and in fishing-time, what sort of a water the river shows to-day; whether there has been rain to the north-west, which floods it, or whether drought, which makes it dry. Whenever the conversation turns upon out-of-door subjects, the river is sure to assert itself somewhere or other, and that before very long. It is the same as a living thing, and that a powerful one; its moods are watched and recorded as if they were the moods of a person in whom one took a deep interest. It is for ever the river, the river; and this watery friend, and enemy—for it is both—gives a colour, and has an influence over the lives that are lived near it, which is very remarkable, especially to those who know nothing of such surroundings. And Tees, be it remarked, is a river with a powerful individuality, which none in his vicinity can afford to despise. ‘He says that because people think so much about the river here,’ said Eleanor. ‘You must know how they talk about it. You never go anywhere without finding the Tees,—in people’s houses as well as here flowing through the meadows. That is what he means.’ ‘I suppose it must be,’ said Effie, who was a philosophical child. And they went on in silence. Eleanor resumed the mental debate which had been occupying her before—as to the wisdom of the step she contemplated taking. It would be separating herself from Otho, at one moment, she thought; and then she remembered Gilbert’s dry words—that Otho left her without scruple, and that no thought of her loneliness would bring him back a moment before it was convenient or pleasant to him to come. That was true; she would most likely see quite as much of him at the Dower House as at Thorsgarth. She had not had a line from him since he had gone away with Gilbert to London. Once or twice she had seen Magdalen, who had mentioned having heard from him; but Eleanor suspected that his letters to Magdalen even, were very brief. Miss Wynter volunteered no details or news, and Eleanor felt no more drawn to her than before, and disdained to ask for information which was not proffered.