“Something I ought to know? I know it already: that Mr. Ridsdale has been visiting at the Lodges. That is nothing so extraordinary. If you think a little attention from a fashionable fop will outweigh the devotion of years!” said the young man, with a flush of high-flown feeling. He had a great deal of sentiment and not very much education, and naturally he was high-flown. “People may say what they like,” he went on in an agitated voice, “but merit does carry the day. They’ve offered me St. Ermengilde over the heads of half-a-dozen. Is it possible, can you suppose, that she should be so blind!” “That wasn’t it,” said Mrs. Purcell quietly; “it’s something quite different, my dear. Shut the door, that we mayn’t have old Pick coming in again (it was he that told me), and you shall hear.” END OF VOL. I. COLLECTION OF BRITISH AUTHORS TAUCHNITZ EDITION. VOL. 1824. WITHIN THE PRECINCTS BY MRS. OLIPHANT. IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. II. WITHIN THE PRECINCTS BY MRS. OLIPHANT, AUTHOR OF “THE CHRONICLES OF CARLINGFORD,” ETC. _COPYRIGHT EDITION._ IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. II. LEIPZIG BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ 1879. _The Right of Translation is reserved._ CONTENTS OF VOLUME II. Page CHAPTER XVII. The Musician at Home 7 -- XVIII. Young Purcell 26 -- XIX. Business, or Love? 44 -- XX. An unconscious Trial 60 -- XXI. Searchings of Heart 77 -- XXII. A Chance for Law 97 -- XXIII. Good Advice 115 -- XXIV. A Crisis 134 -- XXV. What Followed 150 -- XXVI. The Fool’s Paradise 167 -- XXVII. A Terrible Interruption 184 -- XXVIII. The Captain’s Wife 202 -- XXIX. The Heavings of the Earthquake 223 -- XXX. Lottie’s Fate 244