me, I trust"--

"Oh, the flowers are good enough!" said the young lady. "I think the moss
rose is Charles Lambert's favourite, so I have gathered this bunch for
him."

You would scarcely have known the cold-voiced, calm-eyed Miss Monimia,
to be the playful, graceful hoyden of five minutes before. She made
Frank a stately curtsy, and, without farther parley, he hurried down to
the village, and ordered the solitary post-chaise of which the Rose and
Crown could boast.

"Stay you here," he said to Mr Percy Marvale, "and I will join you in
two days if any thing occurs. We may be disappointed again, though the
present intelligence seems authentic."

The intelligence which so suddenly altered the destination of Miss
Monimia Smith's nosegay, was from one of Frank's Leicestershire
correspondents; and was to the effect, that Alice had gone into a
situation in the little village of Wibbleton, where she had been
securely hidden from all her lover's pursuits for half a year.
Wibbelton, he found, was fifteen miles from Bandvale, on the Birmingham
road, and merrily away he trotted as fast as the two posters could go.

The news, the air, the motion, that had such an exhilirating effect on
Frank Edwards, seemed to be equally efficacious in the case of my old
friend Smith. He felt so well on being told of his host's departure,
that he was able to move at once; and, without waiting for consultation
with the doctor, or even for his carriage, he accompanied his daughter
and the indefatigable Percy Marvale across the fields to Howkey on foot.

Meanwhile the hopeful lover drew near the hamlet of Wibbelton. He drove
to the inn as the likeliest place where he could get information, and
entered the common parlour, a neat little whitewashed room, with clean
sanded floor, that looked out upon the village green. At a little table
by the window sat a gentleman reading the newspaper, and occasionally
relieving the dryness of the parliamentary debates by a sip at a little
tankard of beer. He was a neatly dressed old man, with his thin long
hair tied behind in a cue, a bright blue coat buttoned close up to the
throat, stocking-thread pantaloons, and high Hessian boots. His upright
carriage and projecting chest pointed him out at once as a military man;
and the bow he had made, on Frank entering the room, showed at once he
was a man of the old school--very formal and ceremonious--but was
indicative of good-nature at the same time.

"A stranger i