difficult to turn out a benefactor who paid liberally for her privileges, and had so firm a footing in every charitable institution of the county. The vicar was not on vantage-ground in his struggle to hold his own. Miss Bulpit was a pillar of the state of Dullerton. There were not a few who whispered that if either must go to the wall, it had better be the parson than the parishioner. Coals were at famine prices; soup and port-wine are comforting to the soul of man, and the donor’s strictures on S. James and exclusive enthusiasm for S. Paul were things that could be tolerated by those whom they did not concern. Franceline had been to see Miss Merrywig, who lived like a lizard in the grass, with a willow weeping copious tears over her mouldy little cottage. The cheerful old lady always spoke with thankfulness of the quiet and comfort of her home, and believed that everybody must envy her its picturesque situation, to say nothing of the delights of being wakened by the larks before daylight, and kept awake long after midnight by the nightingales. The woods at Dullerton were alive with nightingales. On emerging from the damp darkness after an hour with Miss Merrywig, Franceline found that the sun had climbed up to the zenith, and was pouring down a sultry glow that made the earth smoke again. There was a stile at the end of the wood, and she sat down to rest herself under the thick shade of a sycamore. The stillness of the noon was on everything. A few lively linnets tried to sing; but, the effort being prompted solely by duty, after a while they gave it up, and withdrew to the coolest nooks, and enjoyed their siesta like the lazy ones. Nobody stirred, except the insects that were chirping in the grass, and some bees that sailed from flower to flower, buzzing and doing field-labor when everybody else was asleep or idle. To the right the fields were brimful of ripening grain of every shade of gold; the deep-orange corn was overflowing into the pale amber of the rye, and the bearded barley was washing the hedge that walled it off from the lemon-colored wheat. To the left the rich grass-lands were dotted with flocks and herds. In the nearest meadow some cattle were herding. It was too hot to eat, so they stood surveying the fulness of the earth with mild, bovine gaze. They might have been sphinxes, they were so still; not a muscle in their sleek bodies moved, except that a tail lashed out against the flies now and then. Some were in the open field, holding up their white horns to the sunlight; others were grouped in twos and threes under a shady tree; but the noontide hush was on them all. Presently a number of horses came trooping leisurely up to the pond near the stile; the mild-eyed kine moved their slow heads after the procession, and then, one by one, trooped on with it. The noise of the hoofs plashing into the water, and the loud lapping of the thirsty tongues, was like a drink to the hot silence.