Seizing his friend’s hand as he spoke, he pressed it with such good-will, that Hazlehurst was enabled to give a shrewd guess at the sensation produced by that interesting mediæval amenity, the thumb-screw. And thus mutually pleased and excited, the young men proceeded, both talking volubly, and generally at the same moment, till they reached the stile, where they found Alice awaiting them, looking very timid, very conscious, but exceedingly pretty. She need not have been uneasy, however, for Arthur had too much good taste and kind feeling to laugh at her at that moment; on the contrary, he hastened to set her mind at rest by whispering, as he imprinted a kiss on her glowing cheek-- “My darling child, you have made me almost as happy as you have rendered _him_.” The walk home was a very delightful one. Alice leaned on Harry’s stalwart arm, and felt the most perfect and irrational confidence in his power to shield her from the effects of her father’s anger, Mr. Crane’s despair, and all other uncomfortable consequences of the act of filial disobedience which she meditated. Harry, already experiencing a sensation of delicious proprietorship in regard to the sweet girl beside him, felt himself exalted in the scale of humanity, and held his head a good inch higher on the strength of it; from which moral and physical elevation he looked down upon all field-sports as soulless and ignoble pastimes, and despised them accordingly. Arthur, hoping that his sister’s attachment to a man in every way so worthy of her, would inspire her with the firmness requisite to withstand successfully his father’s possible opposition to the match, and that the matter would eventually end by securing her happiness and that of his friend, “forgot his own griefs,” to rejoice in their bright prospects. And so they reached the pleasure-grounds, where Alice, separating from the two gentlemen, ran in to compose her excited feelings before appearing at breakfast. “Arthur, wait one moment,” exclaimed Coverdale, laying his hand on his friend’s arm to detain him; “I have something important to say to you;--isn’t she an angel, my dear boy?” “Why really, my good fellow, between friends, and seeing that you appear to attach so much importance to the fact, I should say, taking into consideration the evidence in the case, and coming to the point without any unnecessary prolixity, that she was by no means an angel, but simply a very pleasant little female mortal, and--ahem! my poor sister, sir.”