CHAPTER IL

**¥s stormy life preferred to this serene ?”—Youne’s Satires,
_ AND the windows were closed in, and night had succeeded ‘to evening, and the little party at the cottage were grouped ogether. Mrs. Leslie was quietly seated at her tambour-frame ; —Lady Vargrave, leaning her cheek on her hand seemed absorbed na volume before her, but her eyes were not on the page ;— velyn was busily employed in turning over the contents of parcel of books and music which had just been brought from e lodge where the London coach had deposited it. “Oh, dear mamma !” cried Evelyn, “I am so glad; there is mething you will like—some of the poetry that touched you much, set to music.” ~ Evelyn brought the songs to her mother, who roused herself ym her reverie, and looked at them with interest. “It is very strange,” said she, “ that I should be so affected all that is written by this person : I, too” (she added, tenderly oking down Evelyn’s luxuriant tresses), “ who am not so fond reading as you are!” “You are reading one of his books now,” said Evelyn, glancing er the open page on the tabie. “Ah, that beautiful passage on ‘Our First Impressions. Yet I do not like you, dear other, to read his books ; they always seem to make you sad.” “There is a charm to me in their thoughts, their manner of > xpression,” said Lady Vargrave, “which sets me thinking, hich reminds me of—of an early friend, whom I could fancy hear talking while I read. It was so from the first time J pened by accident a book of his years ago.” i “Who is this author that pleases you so much?” asked rs. Leslie, with some surprise; for Lady Vargrave had usually le pleasure in reading even the greatest and most popular laster-pieces of modern genius,
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_. my mother’s enthusiasm.”
“Maltravers!” repeated Mrs. Leslie. “He is, perhaps, a dangerous writer for one soyyoung. At your age, dear girl, you have naturally romance and feeling enough of your own, without seeking them in books.” i
“But, dear madam,” said Evelyn, standing up for her favourite, “his writings do not consist of romance and feeling only; they are not exaggerated, they are so simple—so truthful.” 4
“ Did you ever meet him ?” asked Lady Vargrave, :
“Yes,” returned Mrs. Leslie, “once, when he was a gay, fair- haired boy. His father resided in the next county, and we met. at a country-house. Mr. Maltravers himself has an estate near my daughter in B shire, but he does not live on it; he has been some years abroad—a strange character!” .
“Why does he write no more?” said Evelyn; “I have real his works so often, and know his poetry so well by heart, that I should look forward to something new from him as an event.” —
“T have heard, my dear, that he has withdrawn much from the world and its objects—that he has lived greatly in the East, The death of a lady to whom he was to have been married is said to have unsettled and changed his character. Since that event he has not returned to England. Lord Vargrave can tell you more of him than I.” :
“Lord Vargrave thinks of nothing that is not always before the world,” said Evelyn.
“T am sure you wrong him,” said Mrs, Leslie, looking up andl fixing her eyes on Evelyn’s countenance; “ for you are not belon the world.”
Evelyn slightly—very slightly—pouted her pretty lip, but made no answer. She took up the music, and seating herself at the piano, practised the airs. Lady Vargrave listened with emotion ; and as Evelyn in a voice exquisitely sweet, though not powerful, sang the words, her mother turned away her face, and half unconsciously, a few tears stole silently down her cheek.
When Evelyn ceased, herself affected —for the lines were impressed with a wild and melancholy depth of feeling —she
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