ee not wherein it should be another sort."

"'Tis plain thou didst never feel the same, Lysken," returned Blanche
sentimentally.

"How could I, when I never had an husband?" answered Lysken, darning
away tranquilly.

"But didst thou never come across any that--that thou shouldst fain--"

"Shouldst fain--what?" said Lysken, as Blanche paused.

"Shouldst have liked to wed," said Blanche, plunging into the matter.

"Gramercy, nay!" replied Lysken, turning the stocking to look at the
other side. "And I should have thought shame if I had."

Blanche felt this speech a reflection on herself.

"Lysken!" she cried pettishly.

Lysken put down the stocking, and looked at Blanche.

"What meanest thou?" she inquired, in a plain matter-of-fact style which
was extremely aggravating to that young lady.

"Oh, 'tis to no good to tell thee," returned Blanche loftily. "Thou
wist nought at all thereabout."

"_What_ about?" demanded Lysken, to whom Blanche was unintelligible.

"About nought. Let be!"

"I cannot tell wherefore thou art vexed, Blanche," said Lysken, resuming
her darning, in that calm style which is eminently provoking to any one
in a passion.

"Thou seest not every matter in the world," retorted Blanche, with an
air of superiority. "And touching this matter, 'tis plain thou wist
nothing. Verily, thou hast gain therein; for he that hath bettered
knowledge--as saith Solomon--hath but increased sorrow."

"Blanche, I do not know whereof thou art talking! Did I put thee out by
saying I had thought shame to have cared to wed with any, or what was
it? Why, wouldst not thou?"

This final affront was as the last straw to the camel. Deigning no
answer, which she felt would be an angry one, Blanche marched away like
an offended queen, and sat down on a chair in the hall as if she were
enthroning herself upon a pedestal. Mrs Tremayne was in the hall, and
the door into the parlour being open, she had heard the conversation.
She made no allusion to it at the time, but tried to turn the girl's
thoughts to another topic. Gathering from it, however, the tone of
Blanche's mind, she resolved to give her a lesson which should not eject
her roughly from her imaginary pedestal--but make her come down from it
of her own accord.

"Poor foolish child!" said Mrs Tremayne to herself. "She has mistaken
a rushlight for the sun, and she thinks her horizon wider than that of
any one else. She is despising Lysken, at this mo