ood; I shall almost love them
as much as you do." He had dropped his voice; and spoke in low,
persuasive tones. Ruth hung down her head, and blushed with exceeding
happiness; but she could not speak, even to urge her doubts afresh.
Thus it was in a manner settled.

How delightfully happy the plan made her through the coming week!
She was too young when her mother died to have received any cautions
or words of advice respecting _the_ subject of a woman's life--if,
indeed, wise parents ever directly speak of what, in its depth and
power, cannot be put into words--which is a brooding spirit with no
definite form or shape that men should know it, but which is there,
and present before we have recognised and realised its existence.
Ruth was innocent and snow-pure. She had heard of falling in love,
but did not know the signs and symptoms thereof; nor, indeed, had
she troubled her head much about them. Sorrow had filled up her days,
to the exclusion of all lighter thoughts than the consideration of
present duties, and the remembrance of the happy time which had been.
But the interval of blank, after the loss of her mother and during
her father's life-in-death, had made her all the more ready to value
and cling to sympathy--first from Jenny, and now from Mr Bellingham.
To see her home again, and to see it with him; to show him (secure
of his interest) the haunts of former times, each with its little
tale of the past--of dead and gone events!--No coming shadow threw
its gloom over this week's dream of happiness--a dream which was too
bright to be spoken about to common and indifferent ears.

CHAPTER IV

Treading in Perilous Places

Sunday came, as brilliant as if there were no sorrow, or death, or
guilt in the world; a day or two of rain had made the earth fresh and
brave as the blue heavens above. Ruth thought it was too strong a
realisation of her hopes, and looked for an over-clouding at noon;
but the glory endured, and at two o'clock she was in the Leasowes,
with a beating heart full of joy, longing to stop the hours, which
would pass too quickly through the afternoon.

They sauntered through the fragrant lanes, as if their loitering
would prolong the time, and check the fiery-footed steeds galloping
apace towards the close of the happy day. It was past five o'clock
before they came to the great mill-wheel, which stood in Sabbath
idleness, motionless in a brown mass of shade, and still wet with
yesterday's imm