chairs, a large
table and a little table, blue and muslin curtains, and that
was all. Everything was in the nicest order possible. On the
small table which was placed near the window, with a chair
before it, were laid, one upon the other, the same Bible and
Prayer Book which I had seen in the closet at Bridman; in a
bookcase between the chimney and the window were ranged the
same books which had stood there on the wooden shelf; on the
round table were a few flowers in a glass, and a basket
containing some hemming. There was no fire in the chimney, and
the room felt rather cold.

After a few minutes had elapsed, the door opened and Alice
came in. As she came up to me, her perfect calmness gave me at
once that self-possession which I had vainly struggled for
before-hand. As I kissed her, and sat down by her side, it
felt to me like entering a church on a hot and dusty summer's
day; like leaving behind me the glare and the noise of the
busy world without; like plunging into those

"Arched retreats, where passion's thirst is calmed,
And care's unthankful gloom." *

[* Lyra Apostolica.]

She was simply dressed in a brown silk gown. As she took off
her straw bonnet, and laid it, and a handful of daisies by it,
on the table, she turned to me with one of those grave smiles
which were peculiar to her, and said--

"I have longed to see you again, I am so glad you are come. It
seemed to me as if the trees would never get their leaves in
London; but they are growing at last, and you are come. But
you are looking pale. You are not ill, I hope?"

"No; only very tired, Alice. I am unused to London, and the
noise stuns and bewilders me. You look just as you did a year
ago at Bridman."

A slight colour rose in her cheek at the name of Bridman. "I
was a child _then_, though an old one, and now--"

As she paused I said, "Now a woman, and a happy one I hope,
dear Alice."

She turned her large blue eyes full upon me, something like a
sigh rose in her throat, and she only said, in so low a voice
that I could hardly catch the sound, "God is everywhere!"

After this answer I did not feel courage to speak to her of
Henry, of her own relations, of the circumstances attending
her marriage, of anything, in short, that could cause her pain
or disturbance, and I therefore asked her how she spent her
time in London.

"That will be easily described," she said; "for in London one
day exactly resembles another,--in its employ