He reached Farview about sunset. For the last three or four miles, he had seen the low roof and broad piazzas of his goal looking down upon him from the hill top, as he journeyed up the valley, and when he finally stood on the green and flowery lawn, he felt as if his own being were suddenly and sympathetically magnified an hundred degrees, so wide was the lovely and luxuriant Southern landscape outspread before him. Field and forest spotted it with various verdure; a river drew a bright, wavy line across it; here, the yellow sunshine brought out clearly every line and tint; there, the clouds dimmed it with patches of shadow; and all around was a massive framework of sunset-gilded hills. Half involuntarily, Bergan took off his hat. "How good are the works of God, and how harmonious in their relations to one another, when we get high enough to command a wide view of them!" he reverently thought. "So, too, I doubt not, I shall find it with the dealings of His providence, when once I have climbed to a proper standpoint whence to view them as a whole. Till then, let faith accept the truth which is hidden from sight!" A larger party than he had expected to see, was gathered in the dining-room. A legal brother, who had received a general invitation from Mr. Youle to visit him during the Summer, had hit upon this occasion; one planter from the neighborhood was present by appointment, and another by accident; and there was also a lady friend of Miss Youle, with her young daughter, Nina, besides Miss Thane. The latter signified her remembrance of Bergan by a cool bow; but it was not until dinner was over, and the evening tolerably well advanced, that he found himself in her immediate vicinity. Coralie had been led to the piano, leaving him in a somewhat isolated position, near one of the long windows; and, while the notes of a fairy-like waltz seemed to be dropping from her slender fingers, as they flitted up and down the ivory key-board, he thought he might venture to step out on the moonlit piazza, for a few moments, without being missed. Suiting the action to the thought, he discovered that Miss Thane had made her escape before him. She was leaning against a pillar, looking out over the moon-silvered valley with a weary and wistful expression scarcely in keeping with the calm, icy indifference of her wonted aspect. With a brief apology for interrupting her, he was about to retire, when she spoke, in a tone that seemed to accord him permission to stay if he chose. "Coralie's music sounds sweeter outside than within." Bergan drew near to her, not to let his voice penetrate to the parlor. "That is true, I suspect, of many things in life. To feel their full sweetness, one must get a little out of their immediate sphere." "Is that true of persons, also?" she asked, with a keen glance.