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always used to look down on the colonial girls that our neighbours married, and threatened to go home for a thoroughly accomplished wife; and now one of that stamp has come out to him, and saved him time and money. And Miss Phillips looks far more kindly on him than she ever did on me." "I do not call it merely good luck," said Elsie; "I think our affairs are in wiser hands than our own." "And that I should be grateful for that wise guidance, instead of idly congratulating myself that things have turned out so well," said Brandon. "I only know that I feel grateful, though I am in want of words to express it. A man living alone, as I have done for so many years, feels at a loss to speak about these matters. I need a dear good woman like you by my side to teach me to open my heart, for I know I never will be ashamed to speak to you as I feel--though I might stand in some awe of a poetess, too." "Don't speak about my poetry," said Elsie. "Am I never to hear that song of Wiriwilta, in which I play such a conspicuous part?" said Brandon. "Oh, I have forgotten it, for the children got tired of it, and asked for new songs and stories; it was never written down, and I never can recollect my own verses. It shows that they are not genuine poetry, for I have a tenacious memory for anything good of other people's. So, as it is lost for ever, you may imagine it to have been as beautiful as you please." Chapter VIII. Mrs. Phillips Is Relieved Mrs. Phillips had been much alarmed at the sight of Mr. Brandon almost immediately after Elsie and Mrs. Peck had gone out. He asked for Miss Alice Melville as soon as he entered, saying he had a letter from her sister and messages from the children for her, so that he would stay with Mrs. Phillips till she returned, and sat down before the window looking steadily out to catch the first sight of her. Not having her mother's inventive turn, she was at a loss how to get rid of him. Brandon must not see Mrs. Peck, and Elsie must be warned to say nothing about her to him. She sat in torture for some time, and at last in despair she asked him in an awkward embarrassed way to be good enough to go for a nosegay for her, that she had been promised by a mutual friend at Richmond, that she wished very much to have. He could not help thinking something was wrong. Mrs. Phillips had always been very inconsiderate to Alice, and no doubt she had been sent to town on some errand that s
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