“You'll think nothing of the hill, my Lord, when you've come it three or four times,” said she, with a malicious twinkle of the eye. “Which is precisely what I have no intention of doing.” “What! not cultivate the acquaintance so auspiciously opened?” “Not at this price,” said he, looking at his splashed boots. “And that excursion, that ramble, or whatever be the name for it, you were to take together?” “It is a bliss, I am afraid, I must deny myself.” “You are wrong, my Lord,--very wrong. My brothers at least assure me that Julia is charming _en tête-à-tête_. Indeed, Augustus says one does not know her at all till you have passed an hour or two in such confidential intimacy. He says 'she comes out'--whatever that may be--wonderfully.” “Oh, she comes out, does she?” said he, caressing his whiskers. “That was his phrase for it. I take it to mean that she ventures to talk with a freedom more common on the Continent than in these islands. Is that coming out, my Lord?” “Well, I half suspect it is,” said he, smiling faintly. “And I suppose men like that?” “I 'm afraid, my dear Miss Bramleigh,” said he, with a mock air of deploring--“I 'm afraid that in these degenerate days men are very prone to like whatever gives them least trouble in everything, and if a woman will condescend to talk to us on our own topics, and treat them pretty much in our own way, we like it, simply because it diminishes the distance between us, and saves us that uphill clamber we are obliged to take when you insist upon our scrambling up to the high level you live in.” “It is somewhat of an ignoble confession you have made there,” said she, haughtily. “I know it--I feel it--I deplore it,” said he, affectedly. “If men will, out of mere indolence--no matter,” said she, biting her lip. “I 'll not say what I was going to say.” “Pray do. I beseech you finish what you have so well begun.” “Were I to do so, my Lord,” said she, gravely, “it might finish more than that. It might at least go some way towards finishing our acquaintanceship. I 'm sorely afraid you 'd not have forgiven me had you heard me out.” “I 'd never have forgiven myself, if I were the cause of it.” For some time they walked along in silence, and now the great house came into view--its windows all glowing and glittering in the blaze of a setting sun, while a faint breeze lazily moved the heavy folds of the enormous flag that floated over the high tower. “I call that a very princely place,” said he, stopping to admire it. “What a caprice to have built it in such a spot,” said she. “The country people were not far wrong when they called it Bishop's Folly.” “They gave it that name, did they?” “Yes, my Lord. It is one of the ways in which humble folk reconcile themselves to lowly fortune; they ridicule their betters.” And now she gave a little low laugh to herself, as if some unuttered notion had just amused her. “What made you smile?” asked he. “A very absurd fancy struck me.”