thers arms.

She could hardly see any one but the slight worn-looking mother, whose
low, sad-toned voice awoke such endless recollections, and made her
realize that she was once more beside mamma. To look at her sisters
almost disturbed her; and it well-nigh struck her as unnatural to find
the children hanging on her.

Still more unnatural was it to be conducted up-stairs, like company, to
the best room, and to find her mother in distress and solicitude lest
things should not be comfortable, and such as they were used to. And oh!
the strangeness of seeing her little ones in her own old nursery, waited
upon by the sisters she had left as children--and by Sarah, settled in
there as if she had never been away. One part of her life or the other
must be a dream.

Dear as all the faces were, it was a relief to be silent for a little
while, as Arthur, half-asleep, rested in the large old armchair, and
she unpacked, too happy for weariness; and the clear pure mountain air
breathing in at the open window, infusing life into every vein, as she
paused to look at the purple head above the St. Erme woods, and to gaze
on the fragrant garden beneath; then turned away to call to mind
the childish faces which she had not yet learnt to trace in those
fine-looking young women.

'Ha!' said Arthur, rousing himself; 'are all the pretty plaits and
braids come out again? A welcome sight.'

'Mamma thought me altered,' said Violet; 'and I thought I would not look
more old than I could help; so I would not put on my cap for fear it
should distress her.'

'Old! altered!' said Arthur. 'How dare you talk of such things!'

'I can't help it,' said Violet, meekly.

'Well! I believe I see what you mean,' he said, studying her with a
gravity that was amusing. 'There's your youngest sister, Octavia, is not
she?'

'Oh, is not she pretty?'

'Whish! don't praise yourself; she is the image of you at sixteen. Now
that I have seen her, I see you are changed; but somehow--the word that
always suited you best was lovely; and you have more of that style of
thing than even when your cheeks were pink. Not your oval face and white
skin, you know, but that--that look that is my Violet--my heart's-ease,
that used to keep my heart up last winter. Ay! you are more to my mind!'

That little episode was the special charm of Violet's evening--a happy
one, though there were some anxieties, and a few fond little illusions
dispelled.

It might be the dread of A