"Oh! so am I, Sabrina. I'm as fond of our dear Foresters as you. It isn't of them I had any fear. But, apart from all that, I think it's time we turn our steps homeward. We're surely now two miles from Hollymead; and see! the sun's hastening to go down behind the Welsh hills." While so delivering herself, she faced round, the Welsh hills being behind their backs as they walked towards Drybrook. "Hasten as it likes," rejoined Sabrina, "it can't get down for at least another hour. That will give us ample time to go on to the top of the hill and back to Hollymead before supper; which last, if I mistake not, is the chief cause of your anxiety to be at home." "For shame, Sabrina! You know it isn't--the last thing in my thoughts." Sabrina did know that; knew, also, she was not speaking her own thoughts, but using subterfuge to conceal them. It was herself had proposed the stroll she seemed so desirous of continuing. To her its termination would not be satisfactory without attaining the summit of the ridge whose slope they were ascending. Thrown back by what her younger sister had said, but still determined to proceed, without giving the true reason, she bethought herself of one, false though plausible. "Well, Vag," she laughingly pursued, "I was only jesting, as you know. But there's one thing I hate to do--never could do, that's to half climb a hill without going on to its top. It seems like breaking down or backing out, and crying `surrender,'--which our dear father has taught us never to do. Up to the summit yonder is but a step now. It won't take us ten minutes more to reach it; besides, I want to see something I haven't set eyes on for a long while--that grand valley through which meanders my namesake, Sabrina. And looking back from there, you can also feast your eyes on that in which wanders yours, Vaga, capricious like yourself. In addition," she added, not heeding her sister's shrug of the shoulders, "we'll there get a better view of a glorious sunset that's soon to be over the Hatteral Hills; and the twilight after will give us ample time to get home before the supper table be set. So, why should you hinder me--to say nothing of yourself--from indulging in a little bit of aesthetics?" "Hinder you!" exclaimed Vaga, protestingly. "I hinder! You shan't say that." And at the words she went bounding on upward, like a mountain antelope; not stopping again till she stood on the summit of the hill. CHAPTER FIVE. WAITING AND WATCHING.