high road usually taken by travellers going from London northward,
so that when a young man came riding in towards the middle of the day,
everybody turned from their work to look at him. They did not make a
very close inspection before they raised their hats and cheered; but
this greeting, pleasant as it was, scarcely brought a smile to his lips
as he rode on up to the principal house in the place--Hayslope Grange.
This was a large, rambling, roomy building, half farm-house, half
mansion, standing in the midst of an old-fashioned garden, surrounded by
fields, and enclosed with a moat. The moat was dry now, and had been for
some years, and a permanent bridge of planks had been laid across,
leading to the village; Master Drury would not have it filled up. "It
might be useful yet," he would say, when his son Harry pressed him to
make the alteration.

As the traveller reached the old moss-grown bridge he paused for a
minute or two, and looked down at the broad deep trench. "God grant it
never may be wanted," he murmured; and then he threw back his long brown
curls that clustered round his head, and spurred his horse on at a
quicker pace. He was a fine, tall, handsome young man, about twenty-two,
with a thoughtful brow that would have made him look almost stern, but
for the genial smile that played around his mouth, and the kindly eyes
that looked as ready to cry as a girl's at a tale of suffering. Before
he was half-way across the fields he was met with the glad cry of,
"Harry, Harry, I am so glad you have come home!"

That he was a general favourite at home was evident enough, for his
younger sister and brother received him with screams of delight, and his
elder sister, Mary, forgot all her stateliness in the warmth of her
welcome. Only one of the group walking in the fields failed to run
forward to meet him--a fact Harry was not slow to notice.

"So Maud would not come to greet me," he said, holding out his hand when
he reached the spot where she was standing. He had sprung from his
horse, and left the animal to find his own way to the stable.

The young lady coloured and looked down as Harry stopped before her. "I
am very glad to see you," she said.

"But not quite so glad as my sisters here," said Harry.

"I am not your sister," said Maud, hardly knowing what to say.

"Oh, Maud," muttered little Bessie, "Harry is as much your brother as he
is mine. Why, you have lived with us all your life, and if your name
does