gentlemen shook hands with her still, when she came in their way, no one went out of his or her way to speak to the schoolmistress. It would be vain to say that there was no mortification involved in this change. Cicely felt it in every fibre of her sensitive frame, by moments; but fortunately her temperament was elastic, and she possessed all the delicate strength which is supposed to distinguish "blood." She was strong, and light as a daisy, jumping up under the very foot that crushed her. This kind of nature makes its possessor survive and surmount many things that are death to the less elastic; it saves from destruction, but it does not save from pain. As for Mr. Mildmay, it was soon made very apparent to him that, for him at his age to show much favour or friendship to the schoolmistress at hers, was entirely out of the question. He had to visit the school, of course, in the way of his duty, but to visit Cicely was impossible. People even remarked upon the curious frequency with which he passed the school. Wherever he was going in the parish (they said), his road seemed to turn that way, which, of course, was highly absurd, as every reasonable person must see. There was a side window by which the curious passer-by could see the interior of the school as he passed, and it was true that the new rector was interested in that peep. There were the homely children in their forms, at their desks, or working in the afternoon at their homely needlework: among them, somewhere, sometimes conning little lessons with portentous gravity, the two little boys in their black frocks, and the young school-mistress seated at her table; sometimes (the spy thought) with a flush of weariness upon her face. The little house was quite empty during the school-hours; for Annie was a scholar too, and aspiring to be pupil-teacher some day, and now as reverent of Miss St. John as she had once been critical. Mildmay went on his way after that peep with a great many thoughts in his heart. It became a kind of necessity to him to pass that way, to see her at her work. Did she like it, he wondered? How different it was from his own! how different the position--the estimation of the two in the world's eye! He who could go and come as he liked, who honoured the parish by condescending to become its clergyman, and to whom a great many little negligences would have been forgiven, had he liked, in consequence of his scholarship, and his reputation, and his connections. "We can't expect a man like Mildmay, fresh from a University life, to go pottering about among the sick like poor old St. John," Mr. Ascott would say. "That is all very well, but a clergyman here and there who takes a high position for the Church in society is more important still." And most people agreed with him; and Roger Mildmay went about his parish with his head in the clouds, still wondering where life was--that life which would string the nerves and swell the veins, and put into man the soul of a hero.