ts.

"Good faith, fair ladies, we are in fortune's graces to-day," said the
young peer, gracefully, "since having ridden thus far on our way to
pay you our humble devoirs, we meet you thus short of our journey's
end."

"But how are we to win our way to you," cried Delawarr, "as you sit
there bright _chatelaines_ of your enchanted bower--for I see neither
fairy skiff, piloted by grim-visaged dwarfs, to waft us over, nor even
a stray dragon, by aid of whose broad wings to fly across this mimic
moat, which seems to be something of the deepest?"

"Oh! gallop on, gay knights," said Agnes, smiling on Lord St. George,
but averting her face somewhat from the cornet, "gallop on to the
lodges, and leaving there your coursers, take the first path on the
left hand, and that will lead you to our presence; and should you
peradventure get entangled in the hornbeam maze, why, one of us two
will bring you the clue, like a second Ariadne. Ride on and we will
meet you. Come, sister, let us walk."

Blanche had as yet scarcely found words to reply to the greeting of
the gallants, for the coincidence of their arrival with her own
thoughts had embarrassed her a little, and she had blushed crimson as
she caught the eye of George Delawarr fixed on her with a marked
expression, beneath which her own dropped timidly. But now she arose,
and bowing with an easy smile, and a few pleasant words, expressed her
willingness to abide by her sister's plan.

In a few minutes the ladies met their gallants in the green labyrinth
of which Agnes had spoken, and falling into pairs, for the walk was
too narrow to allow them all four to walk abreast, they strolled in
company toward the Hall.

What words they said, I am not about to relate--for such
conversations, though infinitely pleasant to the parties, are for the
most part infinitely dull to third persons--but it so fell out, not
without something of forwardness and marked management, which did not
escape the young soldier's rapid eye, on the part of Agnes, that the
order of things which had been on the previous evening was reversed;
the gay, rattling girl attaching herself perforce to the viscount, not
without a sharp and half-sarcastic jest at the expense of her former
partner, and the mild heiress falling to his charge.

George Delawarr had been smitten, it is true, the night before by the
gayety and rapid intellect of Agnes, as well as by the wild and
peculiar style of her beauty; and it might we