ve brushed Chrissy's shoes than that she
should clean his belt. She was gone again the moment she had directed
him. A portion of his belt was now as white as snow; but nothing would
have induced her to stay.

Bourhope was new to the humiliations as well as the triumphs of
love--that extreme ordeal through which even tolerably wise and sincere
spirits must pass before they can unite in a strictness of union
deserving the name. He was not exactly grateful for the good suggestion;
indeed, he had a little fight against Chrissy in his own breast just
then. He told himself it was all a whim, he did not really care for the
girl--one of a large family in embarrassed circumstances. No, it would
be absurd to fall in love with a little coffee-coloured girl whose one
shoulder was a fraction of an inch further out than the other. He was
not compelled to marry either Corrie or Chrissy--not he! Poeh! he was
not yet half through with his bachelor days. He would look about a
little longer, enjoy himself a little more. At the word enjoyment
Bourhope stopped short, as if he had caught himself tripping. If Chrissy
Hunter was ugly, she was an ugly fairy. She was his fate, indeed; he
would never see her like again, and he would be a lost and wrecked man
without her.

IV.--THE BALL, AND WHAT CAME OF IT.

The review and the ball were still in store. Bourhope would not be
beaten with that double shot in reserve. It would go hard with the
brown, curly, independent laird if he were beaten, for already he was
shaken more in his pride and confidence than he ever thought to be.

The review, for which all the drilling had been undertaken, went off
without serious effect on the contesting parties. The only thing was,
that Bourhope was so disturbed and so distracted in his mind that he
could not attend to orders, and lost his character as a yeoman, and all
chance of being future fugleman to his corps. And this, although the
Major had said, when the drills began, that there was not a finer man or
more promising dragoon than Bourhope in the regiment.

Chrissy's bright, tranquil satisfaction in contemplating, from the box
of Mrs. Spottiswoode's phaeton, the stand of county ladies, with their
gorgeousness and grace, was decidedly impaired. The review, with its
tramping and halting, its squares and files, its shouting leaders,
galloping aides-de-camp, flashing swords and waving plumes, was
certainly very fine. All the rest of Priorton said so and pro