me," he said, "joggled off
to market like a basket of eggs; but don't smash me, Nell, on the way."

Mrs. Dennistoun stood on the steps looking after them, or rather,
listening after them, for they had soon turned the corner of the house
and were gone. She heard them jogging over the stony road, and the sound
of their voices in the air for a long time after they were out of
sight--the air was so still and so close, nothing in it to break the
sound. The atmosphere was all sunshine, not a cloud upon the sky,
scarcely a breath stirring over those hill-tops, which had almost the
effect of a mountainous landscape, being the highest ground in all the
visible space. Along the other side of the combe, where the road became
visible, there were gleams of heather brilliant under the dark foliage
of the firs. She sat down in the porch and waited to see them pass;
there was a sorrowful background to her thoughts, but for the moment she
was not actually sad, if perhaps a little forlorn. They had gone away
leaving her alone, but yet in an hour or two Elinor was coming back.
Time enough to think of the final parting. Next week Elinor would go and
would not return. Mrs. Dennistoun held on by both hands to to-day and
would not think of that future, near as it was. She waited in a hush of
feeling, so near to great commotions of the heart and mind, but holding
them at a distance in a suspense of all thought, till the shandrydan
appeared in the opening of the road. They were thinking of her, for she
saw a gleam of white, the waving of a handkerchief, as the little
carriage trundled along the road, and for a moment the tears again
blinded her eyes. But Mrs. Dennistoun was very reasonable. She got
up from the cottage porch after the pony carriage had passed in the
distance, with that determination to make the best of it, which is the
inspiration of so many women's lives.

And what a drive the others had through the sunshine--or at least
Elinor! You can never tell by what shadows a man's thoughts may be
haunted, who is a man of the world, and has had many other things to
occupy him besides this vision of love. But the girl had no shadows. The
parting which was before her was not near enough to harm as yet, and
she was still able to think, in her ignorance of the world, that even
parting was much more in appearance than in reality, and that she would
always be running home, always going upon long visits brightening
everything, instead of sadden