Mr. Florestan was a boy of good family; some people would have called him a man, for he was seventeen and a half; he wrote rhymes and bought hot-house flowers; so many girls would have been delighted at his homage. Margaret seemed merely bored: she cried, as she said, from absolute weariness of him and his scented paper; from the perpetual chafing of a small annoyance. His love was too contemptible to cause a stronger feeling; for herself she had never looked at him, and did not know whether he was tall or short. Once or twice when Mrs. Fitzpatrick had called to her, 'Look, Margaret, there goes your devoted swain!' she had been so long in putting down her work, and coming to the window, that he had turned the rocks, or the corner of the road, and the opportunity was lost. And he actually left the place, without her ever having seen more of him than a green coat and brass buttons, with which he was wont to enliven their parish church every Sunday, and which being on an exact level with her eye, she could not without affectation avoid. Such entire indifference to a conquest, Mrs. Fitzpatrick could not understand, and she told Margaret with a smile, that some day she would be more indulgent to the feelings of a lover than she seemed at present. The well-known sharp pain went through Margaret's heart as she spoke; but she smiled too, and said she had a great respect for lovers, but she saw no cause to enrol the Hon. Mr. Florestan in their ranks. And so the subject dropped. After this, many months passed in such stillness, that Margaret hardly knew how they flew. Her only regular correspondent was Lady d'Eyncourt. Her letters formed the one excitement of her life. It was so delightful to trace her from place to place; to hear the little anecdotes of her travels--even the name of Captain Gage, mentioned casually, brought back vividly to her remembrance, the many happy days she had passed at Chirke Weston. And in the few allusions to her husband that her letters contained, it was evident that the devotion she felt for him before marriage, had increased, and was still gathering strength in a degree that it was perilous to indulge. She said, herself, that the unclouded sunshine of her life could hardly last. To say that she adored Sir Philip, was no figure of speech in her case. The more intimately she became acquainted with his character, the more she found to love and to respect. He had no _little_ faults. The reserve which repelled others, vanished entirely with her; and the most exacting of an exacting sex, must have been content with the measure of his fondness. She was not so much his first, as his only object. Captain Gage often said that they were made for each other, and neither party seemed inclined to dispute the opinion. At last, the storm came. After an unusual silence on the part of Elizabeth, Margaret received a letter--a few lines from Captain Gage, announcing the terrible news of Sir Philip's death. He had been