oices that
had prattled what they called love to her; and that divine music, should
she ever hear it again? She had resigned it, had bidden it shine upon
another. For this, in reality, her tears were trickling.

Mr. Raby took a much lighter view of it, and, to divert attention from
her, he said, "Hallo! why this inscription has become legible. It used
to be only legible in parts. Is that his doing?"

"Not a doubt of it," said Amboyne.

"Set that against his sacrilege."

"Miss Carden and I are both agreed it was not sacrilege. What is here in
this pew? A brass! Why this is the brass we could none of us decipher.
Hang me, if he has not read it, and restored it!"

"So he has. And where's the wonder? We live in a glorious age" (Raby
smiled) "that has read the written mountains of the East, and the
Abyssinian monuments: and he is a man of the age, and your mediaeval
brasses are no more to him than cuneiform letters to Rawlinson. Let me
read this resuscitated record. 'Edith Little, daughter of Robert Raby,
by Leah Dence his wife:' why here's a hodge-podge! What! have the noble
Rabys intermarried with the humble Dences?"

"So it seems. A younger son."

"And a Raby, daughter of Dence, married a Little three hundred years
ago?"

"So it seems."

"Then what a pity this brass was not deciphered thirty years ago! But
never mind that. All I demand is tardy justice to my protege. Is
not this a remarkable man? By day he carves wood, and carries out a
philanthropic scheme (which I mean to communicate to you this very day,
together with this young man's report); at night he forges tools that
all Hillsborough can't rival; in an interval of his work he saves a
valuable life or two; in another odd moment he fights like a lion, one
to four; even in his moments of downright leisure, when he is neither
saving life nor taking it, he practices honorable arts, restores the
fading letters of a charitable bequest, and deciphers brasses, and
vastly improves his uncle's genealogical knowledge, who, nevertheless,
passed for an authority, till my Crichton stepped upon the scene."

Raby bore all this admirably. "You may add," said he, "that he
nevertheless finds time to correspond with his friends. Here is a
letter, addressed to Miss Carden, I declare!"

"A letter to me!" said Grace, faintly.

Raby handed it over the pew to her, and turned the address, so that she
could judge for herself.

She took it very slowly and feebly, and her col