In a few minutes the ladies met their gallants in the green labyrinth of which Agnes had spoken, and falling into pairs, for the walk was too narrow to allow them all four to walk abreast, they strolled in company toward the Hall. What words they said, I am not about to relate--for such conversations, though infinitely pleasant to the parties, are for the most part infinitely dull to third persons--but it so fell out, not without something of forwardness and marked management, which did not escape the young soldier's rapid eye, on the part of Agnes, that the order of things which had been on the previous evening was reversed; the gay, rattling girl attaching herself perforce to the viscount, not without a sharp and half-sarcastic jest at the expense of her former partner, and the mild heiress falling to his charge. George Delawarr had been smitten, it is true, the night before by the gayety and rapid intellect of Agnes, as well as by the wild and peculiar style of her beauty; and it might well have been that the temporary fascination might have ripened into love. But he was hurt, and disgusted even more than hurt, by her manner, and observing her with a watchful eye as she coquetted with his friend, he speedily came to the conclusion that St. George was right in his estimate of _her_ character at least, although he now seemed to be flattered and amused by her evident prepossession in his favor. He had not, it is true, been deeply enough touched to feel either pique or melancholy at this discovery, but was so far heart-whole as to be rather inclined to laugh at the fickleness of the merry jilt, than either to repine or to be angry. He was by no means the man, however, to cast away the occasion of pleasure; and walking with so beautiful and soft a creature as Blanche, he naturally abandoned himself to the tide of the hour, and in a little while found himself engaged in a conversation, which, if less sparkling and brilliant, was a thousand times more charming than that which he had yesterday held with her sister. In a short time he had made the discovery that with regard to the elder sister, too, his friend's penetration had exceeded his own; and that beneath that calm and tranquil exterior there lay a deep and powerful mind, stored with a treasury of the richest gems of thought and feeling. He learned in that long woodland walk that she was, indeed, a creature both to adore and to be adored; and he, too, like St. George, was certain, that the happy man whom she should love, would be loved for himself alone, with the whole fervor, the whole truth, the whole concentrated passion of a heart, the flow of which once unloosed, would be but the stronger for the restraint which had hitherto confined it.