he not returned attention with attention; and if Miss Henderson was pleased to pay him compliments, it became him gratefully to acknowledge those compliments. Clearly, therefore, the young lady began to hope that some progress was made in his affections, or at least very soon would be. It was not in her power to ask Mr. Markham to visit her pa; but it was in her power to manage so to bring Mr. Henderson and Mr. Markham together in this party, that an acquaintance might thereby be formed between them. As Mr. Henderson was rather proud of his pulpit performances, he readily accepted Markham's compliments, and he expressed a wish to be better acquainted; and Miss Henderson took care that the conversation should not drop here, but with great ingenuity so contrived that they did not part that evening before Markham had arranged to call on Mr. Henderson. CHAPTER XIII. "Happier she with pliant nature, Fleeting, fickle as the wind-- She who proving one a traitor, Turns to meet another kind." LOVIBOND. Markham was certainly a man of talent in his profession; but it does not follow that because he understood law, he was therefore versed in a knowledge of all the vagaries of the human mind. He was a straightforward, regular, honest-minded man, knowing what he had learned, and capable of learning quickly; but there was much in the world that he knew not, and had never suspected. By this was he occasionally deceived, but not a second time by the same means. Being a modest young man, and supposing that the most confident of the softer sex must be more diffident and retiring than the most diffident of his own sex, he had not the most distant suspicion that Miss Henderson had any design on his heart. Many young men, far below Markham in all that is truly reputable in moral feeling and intellectual discrimination, have frequently fancied that individuals of the softer sex have entertained towards them sentiments of love and affection, and have even made advances. This was a feeling which Markham was much above: he had indeed heard such language made use of by young men of his acquaintance, but he gave them credit for a little exaggeration or a large share of imagination; he never thought it possible that there could be any literal and actual truth in such language. Now the common impression on the human mind is, that the thing which is impossible cannot be; and therefore whenever that which we think to be impossible does actually occur, we almost doubt our own senses, and believe any thing rather than that our notions are incorrect. Markham accordingly could not by any means be brought to believe that Miss Henderson was forming designs upon him; and therefore when he paid his promised visit to the popular preacher, he was most completely off his guard as concerns the designs and intents of Miss Henderson.