been filled with
tears. "It is not worth while. God bless you, my child! You will be
up in London I hope in a fortnight, and we must try to make the house
a little less dull for you."

And so he had encountered the third attack.

Lady Mary, as she was driven home, recovered her spirits wonderfully.
Not a word had fallen from her father which she could use hereafter
as a refuge from her embarrassments. He had made her no promise. He
had assented to nothing. But there had been something in his manner,
in his gait, in his eye, in the pressure of his arm, which made her
feel that her troubles would soon be at an end.

"I do love you so much," she said to Mrs. Finn late on that
afternoon.

"I am glad of that, dear."

"I shall always love you,--because you have been on my side all
through."

"No, Mary;--that is not so."

"I know it is so. Of course you have to be wise because you are
older. And papa would not have you here with me if you were not wise.
But I know you are on my side,--and papa knows it too. And someone
else shall know it some day."

CHAPTER LXVII

"He Is Such a Beast"

Lord Silverbridge remained hunting in the Brake country till a few
days before the meeting of Parliament, and had he been left to
himself he would have had another week in the country and might
probably have overstayed the opening day; but he had not been left to
himself. In the last week in January an important despatch reached
his hands, from no less important a person than Sir Timothy Beeswax,
suggesting to him that he should undertake the duty of seconding the
address in the House of Commons. When the proposition first reached
him it made his hair stand on end. He had never yet risen to his feet
in the House. He had spoken at those election meetings in Cornwall,
and had found it easy enough. After the first or second time he had
thought it good fun. But he knew that standing up in the House of
Commons would be different from that. Then there would be the dress!
"I should so hate to fig myself out and look like a guy," he said to
Tregear, to whom of course he confided the offer that was made to
him. Tregear was very anxious that he should accept it. "A man should
never refuse anything of that kind which comes in his way," Tregear
said.

"It is only because I am the governor's son," Silverbridge pleaded.

"Partly so perhaps. But if it be altogether so, what of that? Take
the goods the gods provide you. Of course all t