e. His presence was demanded
in the Brake country, and it was with difficulty that he had been
induced to give her so much of his time. But what was she to do when
they should leave her? How could she live alone in that great house,
thinking, as she ever must think, of all that had happened to her
there? It seemed to her that everybody near to her was cruel in
demanding from her such a sacrifice of her comfort. Her father
had shuddered when she had proposed to him to accompany her to
Loughlinter; but her father was one of those who insisted on the
propriety of her going there. Then, in spite of that lesson which she
had taught herself while sitting opposite to the glass, she allowed
her fancy to revel in the idea of having him with her as she wandered
over the braes. She saw him a day or two before her journey, when
she told him her plans as she might tell them to any friend. Lady
Chiltern and her father had been present, and there had been no
special sign in her outward manner of the mingled tenderness and
soreness of her heart within. No allusion had been made to any visit
from him to the North. She would not have dared to suggest it in
the presence of her brother, and was almost as much cowed by her
brother's wife. But when she was alone, on the eve of her departure,
she wrote to him as follows:--

Sunday, 1st August, ----

DEAR FRIEND,

I thought that perhaps you might have come in this
afternoon, and I have not left the house all day. I was
so wretched that I could not go to church in the morning;
--and when the afternoon came, I preferred the chance of
seeing you to going out with Violet. We two were alone all
the evening, and I did not give you up till nearly ten. I
dare say you were right not to come. I should only have
bored you with my complaints, and have grumbled to you of
evils which you cannot cure.

We start at nine to-morrow, and get to Saulsby in the
afternoon. Such a family party as we shall be! I did fancy
that Oswald would escape it; but, like everybody else, he
has changed,--and has become domestic and dutiful. Not but
that he is as tyrannous as ever; but his tyranny is now
that of the responsible father of a family. Papa cannot
understand him at all, and is dreadfully afraid of him. We
stay two nights at Saulsby, and then go on to Scotland,
leaving papa at home.

Of course it is very good in Violet and Oswald to come
with