thoroughly respected. Then Mrs. Masters, always spoken of as "pretty Mrs. Masters," or "the pretty widow," was of the party,--a tall handsome woman with large eyes and masses of floating light brown hair, relict of old Dr. Masters, who had left her a capital income, which she seemed determined to keep to herself. Not more than eight-and-twenty, and eminently attractive, she was a source of wonder to her friends, who could not understand why she did not marry again. She had numbers of visitors, male and female; she went into society constantly, and did her due share of dancing and flirtation; but the latter was so mild in kind, and so general in its nature, that no man's name had ever been coupled with hers. Her most intimate enemies raised a report that she was at one time madly in love with Colonel Alsager; but if there was any truth in the rumour, she managed her madness so admirably as never to show a trace of it. She was invaluable in a country-house, for she was thoroughly good-tempered, entered heart and soul into everything that was proposed, and was a great bait for vain bachelors, whose vanity was specially piqued at her long resistance to the charms of their sex. With Mrs. Masters came her cousins, two young ladies named Tyrrell, whose father was a judge in India, who were of the ordinary stamp of pretty, pert, self-satisfied twenty-year-olds. The other ladies in the house do not call for description. Chief amongst the men was Captain Bligh, who, as he walked about and inspected the alterations which had been made under his directions, wondered whether his old father would ever relent, and whether he should have a chance of putting the old hall down in Norfolk in order for himself; or whether he should go on betting and billiard-playing and steeplechase-riding until he "went a tremendous mucker," and either blew his brains out or levanted. And there was Major Winton, who, dressed in a pair of enormous thigh-boots, a dreadnaught, and a sou'-wester, and accompanied by a keeper, went away every morning at dawn to lie out in the marshes for snipe and wild-fowl, and who did not return till dinner-time; immediately after which meal he was accustomed to retire to his bed-room, where a case-bottle of brandy, a jar of Cavendish tobacco, a huge meerschaum-pipe, and the adventures of the Chevalier Faublas, were awaiting him; and with these he would occupy himself until he went to bed. Laurence Alsager was at Redmoor also, though his visit to his father was yet unpaid; and so was Lord Dollamore. The officers of the garrison had called, and the officers of the frigate cruising off Torquay, and the neighbouring gentry; and the whole party seemed to enjoy themselves except Sir Charles Mitford,--whose happiness was not to be long delayed, for the Hammonds were expected on a certain day, which now dawned upon the impatient master of Redmoor.