Such were the regrets which filled her heart, as she sat many an hour in solitude, grieving over the past, and yet afraid to face the future. CHAPTER XVIII. AN ACT OF SETTLEMENT. Were we disposed to heroics, we might compare Mrs. Ricketts's sensations, on entering the grounds of the villa, to the feelings experienced by the ancient Gauls when, from the heights of the Alps, they gazed down on the fertile plains of Italy. If less colored by the glorious hues of conquering ambition, they were not the less practical. She saw that, with her habitual good fortune, she had piloted the Rickettses' barque into a safe and pleasant anchorage, where she might at her leisure refit and lay in stores for future voyaging. Already she knew poor Dalton, as she herself said, from “cover to cover,”--she had sounded all the shallows and shoals of his nature, and read his vanity, his vainglorious importance, and his selfish pride, as though they were printed on his forehead. Were Nelly to be like Kate, the victory, she thought, could not be very difficult. “Let her have but one predominant passion, and be it love of admiration, avarice, a taste for dress, for scandal, or for grand society, it matters not, I'll soon make her my own.” “This will do, Martha!” whispered she, in Miss Ricketts's ear, as they drove up the approach. “I think so,” was the low-uttered reply. “Tell Scroope to be cautious,--very cautious,” whispered she once more; and then turned to Dalton, to expatiate on the beauty of the grounds, and the exquisite taste displayed in their arrangement. “It has cost me a mint of money,” said Dalton, giving way irresistibly to his instinct of boastfulness. “Many of those trees you see there came from Spain and Portugal; and not only the trees, but the earth that's round them.” “Did you hear that, Martha?” interposed Mrs. Rick-etts. “Mr. Dalton very wisely remarks that man is of all lands, while the inferior productions of nature require their native soils as a condition of existence.” “Yes, indeed,” said Dalton, fathering the sentiment at once; “'tis only the blacks that can't bear the cowld. But, after all, maybe they 're not the same as ourselves.” “I own I never could think them so,” smiled Mrs. Rick-etts, as though the very appearance of Peter Dalton had confirmed the prejudice. “Faix! I'm glad to hear you say that,” said he, delightedly. “Tis many's the battle Nelly and me has about that very thing. There's the villa, now--what d' ye think of it?” “Charming--beautiful--a paradise!” “Quite a paradise!” echoed Martha. “'T is a mighty expensive paradise, let me tell you,” broke in Peter. “I've a gardener, and four chaps under him, and sorrow a thing I ever see them do but cut nosegays and stick little bits of wood in the ground, with hard names writ on them; that's what they call gardening here. As for a spade or a hoe, there's not one in the country; they do everything with a case-knife and watering-pot.”