"Cicely," said the curate's gentle voice from the window, "it is time for prayers, and we are all waiting for you. Come in, my dear." Mr. St. John stood looking out with a large prayer-book in his hand. His tall figure, with a slight wavering of constitutional feebleness and age in it, filled up one side of the window, and at his feet stood the two babies, side by side as usual, their hats taken off, and little white pinafores put on over their black frocks, looking out with round blue eyes. There was no agitation about that placid group. The little boys were almost too passive to wonder, and it had not occurred to Mr. St. John as possible that anything calculated to ruffle the countenance or the mind could have been talked of between his daughter and his guest. He went in when he had called them, and took his seat at his usual table. Betsy and Annie stood by the great sideboard waiting for the family devotions, which Betsy, at least, having much to do, was somewhat impatient of; and Mab was making the tea, in order that it might be "drawn" by the time that prayers were over. The aspect of everything was so absolutely peaceful, that when Mr. Mildmay stepped into the room he could not but look at Cicely with a question in his eyes. She, her face flushed and her mouth quivering, avoided his eye, and stole away to her place at the breakfast-table behind. Mildmay, I am afraid, got little benefit by Mr. St. John's prayer. He could not even hear it for thinking. Was this true? and if it was true, what must he do? A perfect tempest raged in the new rector's bosom, while the old curate read so calmly, unmoved by anything but the mild every-day devotion which was habitual to him. Secular things did not interfere with sacred in the old man's gentle soul, though they might well have done so, Heaven knows, had human necessities anything to do with human character. And when they rose from their knees, and took their places round the breakfast-table, Mildmay's sensations became more uncomfortable still. The girl who had denounced him as about to drive her from her home, made tea for him, and asked him if he took cream and sugar. The old man whom he was about to supplant placed a chair for him, and bade him take his place with genial kindness. Mr. Mildmay had been in the habit for the greater part of his life of thinking rather well of himself; and it is inconceivable how unpleasant it is when a man accustomed to this view of the subject, feels himself suddenly as small and pitiful as he did now. Mr. St. John had some letters, which he read slowly as he ate his egg, and Mabel also had one, which occupied her. Only Cicely and the stranger, the two who were not at ease with each other, were free to talk, and I don't know what either of them could have found to say.