r
mamma. Well, and he has promised to take me home with him and give me a
pretty pony--as pretty--as pretty--oh, as pretty as it can be got! And
he is to call again and tell me more: I think he is a fairy, Philip."

"Did he say that he was to take me, too, Sidney?" said Morton, seating
himself, and looking very pale. At that question Sidney hung his head.

"No, brother--he says you won't go, and that you are a bad boy--and that
you associate with wicked people--and that you want to keep me shut up
here and not let any one be good to me. But I told him I did not believe
that--yes, indeed, I told him so."

And Sidney endeavoured caressingly to withdraw the hands that his
brother placed before his face.

Morton started up, and walked hastily to and fro the room. "This,"
thought he, "is another emissary of the Beauforts'--perhaps the lawyer:
they will take him from me--the last thing left to love and hope for. I
will foil them."

"Sidney," he said aloud, "we must go hence today, this very hour-nay,
instantly."

"What! away from this nice, good gentleman?"

"Curse him! yes, away from him. Do not cry--it is of no use--you must
go."

This was said more harshly than Philip had ever yet spoken to Sidney;
and when he had said it, he left the room to settle with the landlady,
and to pack up their scanty effects. In another hour, the brothers had
turned their backs on the town.

CHAPTER X.

"I'll carry thee
In sorrow's arms to welcome Misery."

HEYWOOD's Duchess of Sufolk.

"Who's here besides foul weather?"
SHAKSPEARE Lear.

The sun was as bright and the sky as calm during the journey of the
orphans as in the last. They avoided, as before, the main roads,
and their way lay through landscapes that might have charmed a
Gainsborough's eye. Autumn scattered its last hues of gold over the
various foliage, and the poppy glowed from the hedges, and the wild
convolvuli, here and there, still gleamed on the wayside with a parting
smile.

At times, over the sloping stubbles, broke the sound of the sportsman's
gun; and ever and anon, by stream and sedge, they startled the shy wild
fowl, just come from the far lands, nor yet settled in the new haunts
too soon to be invaded.

But there was no longer in the travellers the same hearts that had made
light of hardship and fatigue. Sidney was no longer flying from a harsh
master, and his step was not elasti