Her reflections or thoughts were all chaos--a mere mass of confusion. Thus, at times she could scarcely realise where she was, or how she came to be on board the _Hermione_, whether the journey by rail to London, her ten days' sojourn there, and her being at present on the sea, were not all a dream--a protracted nightmare, from which she would waken and find herself in her familiar bed-room in dear old Laurel Lodge, which her eyes were never more to see. She thought, "How bright the evening sun may be shining on it now; how gaily down the long leafy vistas of Acton Chase, and on poor mamma's grave. How little could she have conceived that we should be so far from it? But the Lodge--ah, others inhabit it now; others look through the windows and pass through its rooms; others promenade the gravelled walks and play croquet on its grassy lawn, or cull flowers in its conservatory. The place that knew us once, knows us no more; we shall never see it again; never tread its soil, or breathe its air; never more, never more!" Her tears fell, tears that fell hot and fast. "Oh, to be with Morley and at rest," she sighed in her heart. "But then there is papa, poor papa, who loves me so well, and Rose." Her father's kind and benevolent face, sweet, ruddy Rose's happy smile, and the familiar visage of Hawkshaw (who had become exceeding gentle and attentive), were ever before her. But Laurel Lodge, with its home life, its elegance, and quiet details, with the face, voice, image, existence, and loss of Morley Ashton, seemed all to have passed away to a vast distance from her. In a very few days she seemed to have lived a great many years in thought and suffering. "Cheer up, Ethel--permit me to call you so," said Hawkshaw, who had been silently regarding her sweet, pensive face. "Cheer up," he repeated, in a low voice; "think of what is before us in the Mauritius--the lovely Isle of France--the land of Paul and Virginia, that amiable little Virginia, about whom every lady at least once in life sheds so many tears, especially when in her early teens. We must go over all the places depicted by Bernardin St. Pierre in his novel; the Shaddock Grove, the Mount of Discovery, Cape Misfortune, and the Bay of the Tomb--eh?" "In pity leave me to myself," said Ethel, on whose sensitive ear his half-jocular voice sounded gratingly. "As you please," he muttered, under his breath, with impatience, as he went to leeward and lit a cigar. Next evening Ethel wept again, as she saw the last of England--the lovely coast of Devon, with all its apple-bowers mellowing in the sun--fade into a blue streak, that blended with the evening sea. Then, for the first time, sea and sky, cloud and water were around them, and she strove to rouse herself from the apathy that had been oppressing her faculties, and endeavoured, if she could not speak, at least to listen to the conversation of others.