Nothing seemed more likely to Monteagle than this, especially as Blodget had so understood the matter, and Blodget had received his information from Brown. Besides, might not Brown have seen Blodget that day, and as the youth had become suddenly silent when the ‘great secret’ was told him, had not Blodget interpreted this silence as despair of success and consequently melancholy, and so reported it to Brown? All that evening, Julia was extremely lively, and sometimes her aunt regarded her with surprise if not disapprobation, so piquant were her sallies and so pointed was her ridicule. Monteagle was more than usually grave; not only from his want of sleep on the preceding night, but because he thought he had detected the source of Julia’s gaiety, and the mistake under which she labored. At length, when Monteagle rose to retire, Julia contrived to place herself near the door, and as he went out, half asleep, and feeling very dull, she softly whispered the one word ‘Hope!’ Monteagle started as if struck by an arrow at this confirmation of his fears. The poor girl had mistaken his gravity and dullness for that despair which Brown had taught her to believe he was laboring under, and had ventured to tell him that he might hope! As Monteagle hurried off to his chamber, he knew not whether to laugh or cry. There was something very comic in this mistake. The blundering Brown, with his big nose, getting hold of his story at the wrong end, and hurrying off to banter Julia about her conquest was ridiculous enough: but then the unfortunate girl who had suffered herself to be so readily deluded into the belief that her love was returned, and undertaking to cheer his supposed melancholy by a kind word, called forth his sincerest sympathy. In the morning early, Monteagle met Julia in the garden. ‘You are an early riser, sir,’ said she, ‘as well as myself. I think the morning is the best part of the day.’ ‘I am of your mind,’ returned Monteagle, ‘and so are many others, who rise early to get their morning bitters.’ ‘So I have been told,’ said Julia, with a gay laugh. ‘Am I to understand that Mr. Monteagle—’ ‘Oh, no. I am not one of them,’ replied the youth. ‘Instead of bitters, I fall in with _sweets_, it seems.’ ‘Yes, the flowers are fragrant,’ said Julia, looking about her, and evading the compliment with the pleased and rather triumphant air of one who, _now_, felt secure of the affections of him who offered it.