“Oh, mamma!” exclaimed Victoria, “yonder’s old Mr Graeme of Mossgray riding along the avenue;--what will he want, I wonder? oh goodness, mamma, isn’t it strange? let me go to see.” “Old Mr Graeme of Mossgray!” exclaimed Mrs Fendie, rising; “be quiet, Victoria, how dare you interrupt me? A very strange visitor certainly:--you have not seen him since your marriage, Charlotte:--perhaps he has heard you are here, and intends to be like other people for once in his life.” Mrs Heavieliegh lifted her eyelids with some apparent difficulty and looked a little ashamed; to tell the truth, she had been dozing during her mother’s _preche_, and did not at all know what this commotion was about. Mrs Fendie’s address was broken short, but Hope perceived Lilias Maxwell still trembling in her chair. There was a deep bow-window in the end of the room; the new governess, unnoticed in the little bustle of interest with which the Fendie family awaited their unusual visitor, stole by degrees into its recess. Hope Oswald followed her; it was scarcely quite delicate perhaps; but Hope was anxious to express something of her sympathy. Lilias leaned upon the window--she shook so much that she needed it--and the sympathetic girl beside her saw how thin and transparent the long white fingers were, which tremblingly supported her brow. “If you please, Miss Maxwell,” said Hope compassionately, “I am afraid you are not well; and I wish my mother were only here, for she would know--and, Miss Maxwell, if you please, do not look so sad.” The stranger could not bear this; she turned her head away, and shrank further into the shadow of the curtains, and pressed her thin fingers upon her eyes, but the tears would be restrained no longer, and Hope hastily placed herself in front of the window, that no eyes but her own might perceive the agony of silent weeping, which the unfriended, solitary girl could not control. She had borne as she best could the foolish levity and inconsiderate rudeness of the children, and half bewildered with the long stretch of endurance, had silently suffered the chill unpitying lectures of Mrs Fendie, but the first touch of kindness made the full cup overflow. All the simple philosophies with which Lilias had tried to subdue the natural strength of her feelings, could not make her grief less green and recent; and Hope stood reverently by, in silence, while the tears poured down like rain, and the shadowy figure before her shook with suppressed sobs. The child Hope had become the benefactor of the orphan, for there was healing in those tears. CHAPTER VIII. Amang the fremd I had wandered lang, Heavy was my heart, and sad my sang; Ae green sod covered a’ my kin, There were storms without, and nae hope within, When through the mist a sun-glint came, And I heard a voice, and it aye said hame-- Hame, oh hame! is there rest for me But an’ aneath the green willow tree?--BALLAD.