I gave him a look implying, "Who are you?" "Your cousin Edward Thornton," he answered bowing. "I thought so;" I replied gravely, "I remember letting you in by the side-door." "And I have been so fortunate as to help to let you out through the window." I laughed at the turn our discourse was taking. There was a well-bred ease in his manner, sufficient of itself to banish all shyness. "My dilemma," he said quietly, "is very different from yours, Miss Burns; I am in the same unfortunate position, in which you found me seven years ago: I cannot get in. I have tried three doors--in vain." "Here is a fourth," I replied pointing to a low side-door. He knocked against it with his cane, but received no reply. "Decidedly," gravely observed Edward Thornton, "the place is enchanted. As old Spenser would say: 'There reigns a solemn silence over all; Nor voice is heard--'" Here he broke down in the quotation; I ventured to suggest the rest: "--nor wight is seen in bower or hall." "Thank you," he said, with a gracious inclination of his handsome head. "You like Spenser?" he added, resuming the task of tapping against the door with the end of his elegant cane. "Yes," I answered, "and you?" He turned round to give me a surprised look of his fine blue eyes, but he quietly replied: "Yes, I admire Spenser very much." He was at the door again, and this time he condescended to apply to it the heel of a very handsome, aristocratic foot, when a thin, high voice behind us observed: "This way, Edward; I have found means of entering, but I never saw a more barbarous place, never." We both looked round; a lady of middle age, very slender, and attired in pale blue bar?ge, a white lace cloak and a tulle bonnet, over which she balanced a delicate white parasol, was advancing towards us with mincing steps. I fancied I recognised Mrs. Brand, and I was not mistaken. "Have you found no one?" asked her brother. "I have found an idiotic house-maid, and an old goblin housekeeper, from neither of whom could I extract anything, save that Mr. Thornton never so much as hinted we were coming; but that, as our carriage entered the avenue, he was seen to rush from the study, and vanish down the park. Gracious, very!" "Characteristic," said Edward Thornton, smiling with languid grace. "My dear Edward," solemnly observed his sister, "are you aware that there are no beds ready, or indeed, in existence, and that Marks--I believe that is her name--declares there is not a pound of meat in the house." Edward Thornton's handsome face lengthened visibly. "Really," he said, "really!" "I do not mind it," continued Mrs. Brand; "but I am ashamed at the slur cast on our national hospitality. It is one of those things which, if related to me, I should have dismissed with the reply: 'Absurd--not English--absurd!' I am now compelled to acknowledge it as a melancholy fact, from which I cannot help drawing certain conclusions."