Although now one and twenty, her life had been, in its outward course, so calm and circumscribed, within the current of home interests, and domestic affections; so gently and gradually had the home circle broken up around her, link by link falling away, till she scarcely felt the influence of the change, that it was with confiding pleasure rather than any anxious care, or restless misgiving, she contemplated an entrance upon a changed sphere of action, never doubting but that she should find love and affection, such as she had ever been accustomed to receive, in all those professing friends who now came forward with proffered assistance in her time of need. "In every heart a home, in every home a heaven." In the warm-hearted cousin she remembered of old, one in whom she might repose trust and confidence, as in a brother, and in his beautiful and engaging wife the truth and sympathy of a sister. Seated, therefore, upon the heathy common, there was more of pleasant dreaminess than of regretful sadness influencing her spirit, as her eyes wandered over the prospect spread before her with the attention of one, who would fain engrave each familiar feature on her memory, and bear away therein, a true and vivid picture of their beauties. The pretty valley we have described lay immediately at her feet, with the woods beyond, amongst which proudly rose the mansion of Plas Glyn, of which her sister, by her marriage that morning with Sir Hugh Morgan, had become the youthful mistress; and a faint peculiar smile played on Mary's countenance as she sat there in her solitary freedom, and dwelt for a moment on this feature of the landscape. But it had passed away, when her glance turned towards the spot where stood her own more modest, but still fairer home, Glan Pennant--then upwards, where the mountain ridges towering one above the other, were now eradiated by one of those sunsets of rare magnificence, which nature seemed to have called forth on this occasion, as a farewell token of affection to her meek and loving votary. CHAPTER II. Once, and once only, let me speak Of all that I have felt for years; You read it not upon my cheek, You dreamed not of it in my tears. L. E. L. Whilst thus absorbed, a step whose sound the soft carpeting on which it trod had not permitted her to hear, approached near to where Mary Seaham sat, and a voice broke upon her reverie. She started a little, but perceiving who was the intruder, with a smile and only a slightly heightened colour, she arose and frankly extended her hand with the gentle exclamation: "Mr. Temple!" The person thus addressed was a man in the full vigour of his days; of tall commanding figure, whose pale and noble countenance seemed to wear less marks of worldly care than of high and chastened thought.