volent old lady opposite to
her, and the guard prepared to give her every attention, there was no
time to realise anything, except that she must make haste.

"Well, I think you're all right now," said Mr Forrest, with a sigh of
relief, as he rested from his exertions. "Look out for your aunt on the
platform at Dornton; she said she would meet you herself.--Why," looking
at his watch, "you don't start for six minutes. We needn't have hurried
after all. Well, there's no object in waiting, as I'm so busy; so I'll
say good-bye now. Remember to write when you get down. Take care of
yourself."

He kissed his daughter, and was soon out of sight in the crowded
station. Anna had now really begun her first journey out into the
world.

CHAPTER TWO.

DORNTON.

A bird of the air shall carry the matter.

On the same afternoon as that on which Anna was travelling towards
Waverley, Mrs Hunt, the doctor's wife in Dornton, held one of her
working parties. This was not at all an unusual event, for the ladies
of Dornton and the neighbourhood had undertaken to embroider some
curtains for their beautiful old church, and this necessitated a weekly
meeting of two hours, followed by the refreshment of tea, and
conversation. The people of Dornton were fond of meeting in each
other's houses, and very sociably inclined. They met to work, they met
to read Shakespeare, they met to sing and to play the piano, they met to
discuss interesting questions, and they met to talk. It was not,
perhaps, so much what they met to do that was the important thing, as
the fact of meeting.

"So pleasant to _meet_, isn't it?" one lady would say to the other.
"I'm not very musical, you know, but I've joined the glee society,
because it's an excuse for _meeting_."

And, certainly, of all the houses in Dornton where these meetings were
held, Dr Hunt's was the favourite. Mrs Hunt was so amiable and
pleasant, the tea was so excellent, and the conversation of a most
superior flavour. There was always the chance, too, that the doctor
might look in for a moment at tea-time, and though he was discretion
itself, and never gossiped about his patients, it was interesting to
gather from his face whether he was anxious, or the reverse, as to any
special case.

This afternoon, therefore, Mrs Hunt's drawing-room presented a busy and
animated scene. It was a long, low room, with French windows, through
which a pleasant old garden, with a wide lawn and sh