vation and difficulty, and to be achieved only with great
distress, fatigue, and suffering--had it been the dawn of some painful
enterprise, certain to task his utmost powers of resolution and
endurance, and to need his utmost fortitude, but only likely to end, if
happily achieved, in good fortune and delight to Nell--Kit's cheerful
zeal would have been as highly roused: Kit's ardour and impatience
would have been, at least, the same.

Nor was he alone excited and eager. Before he had been up a quarter of
an hour the whole house were astir and busy. Everybody hurried to do
something towards facilitating the preparations. The single gentleman,
it is true, could do nothing himself, but he overlooked everybody else
and was more locomotive than anybody. The work of packing and making
ready went briskly on, and by daybreak every preparation for the
journey was completed. Then Kit began to wish they had not been quite
so nimble; for the travelling-carriage which had been hired for the
occasion was not to arrive until nine o'clock, and there was nothing
but breakfast to fill up the intervening blank of one hour and a half.
Yes there was, though. There was Barbara. Barbara was busy, to be
sure, but so much the better--Kit could help her, and that would pass
away the time better than any means that could be devised. Barbara had
no objection to this arrangement, and Kit, tracking out the idea which
had come upon him so suddenly overnight, began to think that surely
Barbara was fond of him, and surely he was fond of Barbara.

Now, Barbara, if the truth must be told--as it must and ought to
be--Barbara seemed, of all the little household, to take least pleasure
in the bustle of the occasion; and when Kit, in the openness of his
heart, told her how glad and overjoyed it made him, Barbara became more
downcast still, and seemed to have even less pleasure in it than before!

'You have not been home so long, Christopher,' said Barbara--and it is
impossible to tell how carelessly she said it--'You have not been home
so long, that you need to be glad to go away again, I should think.'

'But for such a purpose,' returned Kit. 'To bring back Miss Nell! To
see her again! Only think of that! I am so pleased too, to think that
you will see her, Barbara, at last.'

Barbara did not absolutely say that she felt no gratification on this
point, but she expressed the sentiment so plainly by one little toss of
her head, that Kit was q