“Then you are mistaken. I have known no pleasanter hours than those I have spent at the Vicarage. Besides, how could I get on with my improvements? who would plan my walks, or choose my papers, or design my greenhouses?――no, I am not such an idiot as to throw away a valuable friendship when I have once made it.” Hilary laughed lightly, as her only reply. “Gwyneth,” added he, pulling the child toward him as he sat on the turf, “you know very well that I could not do without you and Sybil to help me, don’t you?” “We could not get on without you,” replied Gwyneth; “Hilary wants to go on learning German, and I am sure nobody could teach her so well; and your French and English books, and your music and paintings are much better, and nicer, and prettier than any we have of our own.” “But then, Gwyneth,” whispered he, “you have things which I have not――much better things, things that I can not buy.” “I thought you had money enough to buy every thing you wanted,” said Gwyneth. “Not every thing. I can not buy a father, or sisters, or a brother like Maurice――and you have all these, which I want; so who is best off?” Gwyneth looked uncertain, or unwilling to speak. “Suppose you were to give me back my sketch-book?” said Hilary, stretching out her hand for it; but he drew it back out of her reach, with a look which quieted Hilary, and prevented her saying any more, although she could not easily have told why. The father and son returned, during the silence which ensued after Hilary’s last speech; and Sybil, who had been very industriously working away at her sketch, now held it up for approbation, which it obtained, as it deserved. The party then prepared to return homeward, and little Nest, who had been wandering about under the charge of Gwyneth, was recalled, and once more lodged in her pannier. Mr. Huyton was pressed to come in as usual; but thinking that on the last evening the family would be more comfortable without a stranger of the party, he declined, and mounting his horse, after very cordial farewells to Maurice, he rode slowly home, meditating on the charms of Hilary, and thinking what he should do with regard to her. To let things take their own course, and be decided hereafter by events, seemed to him the best thing to do. In the mean time he carried away the sketch-book, with the intention of abstracting and appropriating the unfinished sketch on which her tears had fallen, and giving her a copy, of his own doing, of the scene she had attempted to delineate.