from the window to the very last, his face
was so bright with smiles, that he hardly looked ill.

For some days Sweep and I were absent, fishing.

When I returned, I found on my mantelpiece a black-edged letter in an
unfamiliar hand. But for the black I should have fancied it was a
bill. The writing was what is called "commercial." I opened it and
read as follows:

"North Side Mills, Blackford,

Yorks. 4/8, 18--.

"SIR,

"I have to announce the lamented Decease of my
Brother--Reverend Reginald Andrewes, M.A.--which took place
on the 3rd inst. (3.35 A.M.), at Oak Mount, Blackford; where
a rough Hospitality will be very much at your Service,
should you purpose to attend the Funeral. Deceased expressed
a wish that you should follow the remains; and should your
respected Father think of accompanying you, the Compliment
will give much pleasure to Survivors.

"Funeral party to leave Oak Mount at 4 P.M. on Thursday next
(the 8th inst.), D.V.

"A line to say when you may be expected will enable me to
meet you, and oblige,

"Yours respectfully,

"JONATHAN ANDREWES.

"Reginald Dacre, Esq., Jun."

It is useless to dwell upon the bitterness of this blow. My father
felt it as much as I did, and neither he nor I ever found this loss
repaired. One loses some few friends in a lifetime whose places are
never filled.

We went to the funeral. Had the cause of our journey been less sad, I
should certainly have enjoyed it very much. The railway ran through
some beautiful scenery, but it was the long coach journey at the end
which won my admiration for the Rector's native county. I had never
seen anything like these noble hills, these grand slopes of moorland
stretching away on each side of us as we drove through a valley to
which the river running with us gave its name. Not a quiet, sluggish
river, keeping flat pastures green, reflecting straight lines of
pollard willows, and constantly flowing past gay villas and country
cottages, but a pretty, brawling river with a stony bed, now yellow
with iron, and now brown with peat, for long distances running its
solitary race between the hills, but made useful here and there by
ugly mills built upon the banks. Sometimes there was a hamlet as well
as a mill. Tracts of the neighbouring moorland were enclosed and
cultivated, the fields being divided by stone walls, which looked rude
and strange enough to us. The cottages