from good-humour, partly from an exceedingly off-hand natural manner, forced even Lady Banneret to be civil to her. Then came the Marmadukes and the Marygolds, and old Miss Finch in a sedan-chair from the adjoining village, and a goodish-looking man whose name I never made out, and Mr. Sprigges the curate; and lastly, in a white heat and a state of utter confusion, my shy acquaintance of the railway and the pointers, who was ushered in by Lady Horsingham's pompous butler under the style and title of Mr. Haycock. He appeared to be a great friend of the family; and, much to his own discomfiture, was immediately laid violent hands on by my aunt and cousin--the former not thinking it necessary to present him to me, till he offered me his arm to take me in to dinner, when her face of reproval, on his stammering out he "had met Miss Coventry before," was worth anything, expressive as it was of shocked propriety and puzzled astonishment. When you have a secret only known to your two selves, even with a shy man, it is wonderful how it brings him on. Before the soup was off the table Squire Haycock and I had become wonderfully good friends. He had hoped "my ankle did not pain me," and I had trusted "his arms did not ache." He had even gone the length of "vowing" that he would have shot his clumsy retriever for being the cause of the accident, only he let him off because "if it hadn't been for the dog----" and here, seeing Cousin Amelia's eye fixed upon us, my companion stopped dead short, and concealed his blushes in a glass of champagne. Taking courage from that well-iced stimulant, he reverted to our railway journey in company. "I knew you again this morning, Miss Coventry, I assure you, a long way off; in fact, I was going the other way, only, seeing you walking in that lonely part of the down, I feared you might be frightened" (he was getting bright scarlet again), "and I determined to watch you at a little distance, and be ready to assist you if you were alarmed by tramps or sheep-dogs or----" I thought he was getting on too fast, so I stopped him at once by replying,--