nted!'

Darsie's head turned round; and it was perhaps well that Redgauntlet
called on him to sit down, as even that movement served to hide his
confusion. There is an old song which says--

--when ladies are willing,
A man can but look like a fool;

And on the same principle Darsie Latimer's looks at this unexpected
frankness of reception, would have formed an admirable vignette for
illustrating the passage. 'Dearest Darsie,' and such a ready, nay, eager
salute of lip and hand! It was all very gracious, no doubt--and ought to
have been received with much gratitude; but, constituted as our friend's
temper was, nothing could be more inconsistent with his tone of feeling.
If a hermit had proposed to him to club for a pot of beer, the illusion
of his reverend sanctity could not have been dispelled more effectually
than the divine qualities of Green Mantle faded upon the ill-imagined
frank-heartedness of poor Lilias. Vexed with her forwardness, and
affronted at having once more cheated himself, Darsie could hardly help
muttering two lines of the song we have already quoted:

The fruit that must fall without shaking
Is rather too mellow for me.

And yet it was pity for her too--she was a very pretty young woman--his
fancy had scarcely overrated her in that respect--and the slight
derangement of the beautiful brown locks which escaped in natural
ringlets from under her riding-hat, with the bloom which exercise had
brought into her cheek, made her even more than usually fascinating.
Redgauntlet modified the sternness of his look when it was turned
towards her, and in addressing her, used a softer tone than his usual
deep bass. Even the grim features of Cristal Nixon relaxed when he
attended on her, and it was then, if ever, that his misanthropical
visage expressed some sympathy with the rest of humanity.

'How can she,' thought Latimer, 'look so like an angel, yet be so mere
a mortal after all? How could so much seeming modesty have so much
forwardness of manner, when she ought to have been most reserved? How
can her conduct be reconciled to the grace and ease of her general
deportment?'

The confusion of thoughts which occupied Darsie's imagination, gave to
his looks a disordered appearance, and his inattention to the food which
was placed before him, together with his silence and absence of mind,
induced Lilias solicitously to inquire, whether he did not feel some
return of the disorder under which he had su