Tom Pynsent's ride with Miss Wetheral only led the way to repeated engagements at Wetheral on his part, and on Lady Wetheral's side, to affectionate welcomes and smiles upon his entrance. At every opportunity, and upon every occasion, Tom Pynsent was appointed to take charge of "dear Anna Maria," and her ladyship thanked him in flattering terms for the delightful accession of health which Miss Wetheral had gained by constant and agreeable horse-exercise. Anna Maria did, indeed, gain both health and happiness from the repeated _tête-à-têtes_ which fell to her lot with the man she loved. The tone of conversation, his shy manner--so like his manner with Julia--his anxiety to form fresh engagements to meet again; all convinced her his affections were surrendered to herself. Her cheek resumed its bloom, her eye regained its brightness, and her figure became more elastic; there was hope in her smiles, and lightness in her movements, which formed an extraordinary change in the once insipid Miss Wetheral. Anna Maria must ever appear gentle and peculiarly feminine, but she was no longer painfully inert or tranquil, to a death-like stillness. It was a rapid and complete change; a change which proved how powerfully unrequited love had dealt with a heart which could now rise at the touch of affection, from torpid listlessness, to the joys of life; which could spring at once from cold and weary melancholy, to the light and warmth of a joyous mind, revelling in happy prospects. Sir John Wetheral perceived Tom Pynsent's attentions with pleasure. His honest heart and honourable feelings promised every happiness, he said, to a woman who could prefer heart to head, and, if Anna Maria had the sense to choose him instead of the lordlings whom Julia coveted, he could insure her a happy married life, if it were not her own fault. He wished he could prophecy equal content to Julia, but she had planned her own marriage, and she must abide the issue; Lady Wetheral must blame herself, if Julia was unhappy, for she had brought up her daughters to consider wealth and station a balance to the weight of matrimonial misery, and her remarks and sentiments taught Julia to believe she had done well in selling herself to the highest bidder. Lady Wetheral never could endure her husband's observations, when they touched upon her government of children, and his present remarks brought down a thousand reproaches. "I think, Sir John, you might spare me what I can only term abuse, and which you level at me now upon all occasions." "My dear, you are wrong; abuse never issues from my lips."