Whilst Charlotte was always on the look-out for some _preux chevalier_, who was to be at her feet and vow eternal devotion, Joyce had as yet no such airy castles. Her education had been widely different from her cousin's, and home and home interests had so filled her seventeen years with their joys and pleasures, that she had no time to dream over "keepsakes," and read Miss Burney's romances, or steep herself in the unreality of sentimental verses, which Wordsworth was beginning to break down and send into the shadows, by bringing out the beauties of creation into the strong light, which his genius threw around them. Joyce had not wasted her youth in foolish dreams of impossible perfection, but when the real story of her life was ready to unfold itself, she would find a zest and fulness in it, that the sentimental visionary could never know. That was a memorable walk over the sweet country side, with the west all aglow, and the sky above serenely blue. In after years both looked back on it through that mist of tender sadness, which gathers round the happy past of youth, even though the present is full of the fruition of joy to which that very past led. "This is our last evening," Gilbert said; "I hope, if I can be of any use, you will write to me." "Yes," Joyce said, "and I feel as if the worst were over now. If Melville has a year abroad with the gentleman the bishop recommends, he may settle afterwards. Of course it is a great pull upon father's purse; but if Harry and Bunny can get into the navy we shall be able to manage." "When we are settled in Clifton I hope you will come and see my mother." "Oh! I should like that very much; but I have a visit to Barley Wood to come first, and then in the winter I must do all I can to cheer father. He feels the want of out-door exercise now he has given up his hunters. He used to ride to the meet very often." "I am sorry he has had to give that up, all through Melville's extravagance." "Yes, and then farming has been so bad the last year or two. I hope it may be a better crop this year; but the wheat in this district is very poor at all times. We must not get too much to the right," she said, "or we shall get near the miners, who are a rough set of people. Mrs. More has had a school in these parts for many years; but there are a great many discontented folks, who seem to think the gentry are their natural enemies. That man we saw the day you came to Wells was from these parts." Joyce raised her voice in a clear, ringing tone, and called her brothers by name. "They have gone on so far in front," she said; "but I feel sure this is the right track." She called again, but there was no reply. "We had better walk faster," she said, "or we shall be left behind;" then she stopped. "I see a man lying in that dip under the gorse-bushes. I hope he will not beg."