any one more so."

Miss Hastings laughed; there was an expression of great amusement on her
face.

"She is certainly very original, Captain Langton; quite different from
the pattern young lady of the present day."

"She is magnificently handsome," he continued; "but her manners are
simply startling."

"She has very grand qualities," said Miss Hastings; "she has a noble
disposition and a generous heart, but the want of early training, the
mixing entirely with one class of society, has made her very strange."

"Strange!" cried the captain. "I have never met with any one so blunt,
so outspoken, so abrupt, in all my life. She has no notion of repose or
polish; I have never been so surprised. I hear Sir Oswald coming, and
really, Miss Hastings, I feel that I cannot see him; I am not equal to
it--that extraordinary girl has quite unsettled me. You might mention
that I have gone out in the grounds to smoke my cigar; I cannot talk to
any one."

Miss Hastings laughed as he passed out through the open French window
into the grounds. Sir Oswald came in, smiling and contented; he talked
for a few minutes with Miss Hastings, and heard that the captain was
smoking his cigar. He expressed to Miss Hastings his very favorable
opinion of the young man, and then bade her good-night.

"How will it end?" said the governess to herself. "She will never marry
him, I am sure. Those proud, clear, dark eyes of hers look through all
his little airs and graces; her grand soul seems to understand all the
narrowness and selfishness of his. She will never marry him. Oh, if she
would but be civilized! Sir Oswald is quite capable of leaving all he
has to the captain, and then what would become of Pauline?"

By this time the gentle, graceful governess had become warmly attached
to the beautiful, wayward, willful girl who persisted so obstinately in
refusing what she chose to call "polish."

"How will it end?" said the governess. "I would give all I have to see
Pauline mistress of Darrell Court; but I fear the future."

Some of the scenes that took place between Miss Darrell and the captain
were very amusing. She had the utmost contempt for his somewhat
dandified airs, his graces, and affectations.

"I like a grand, rugged, noble man, with the head of a hero, and the
brow of a poet, the heart of a lion, and the smile of a child," she said
to him one day; "I cannot endure a coxcomb."

"I hope you may find such a man, Miss Darrell," he return