was 'humble companion' to Mrs. Moss. She was in reality
single, but she exacted the married title as a point of respect. At
the beginning of our acquaintance I called her 'Miss Metcalfe,' and
this occasioned the only check our friendship ever received. Now I
would, with the greatest pleasure, have addressed her as 'My Lord
Archbishop,' or in any other style to which she was not entitled, it
being a matter of profound indifference to me. But the question was a
serious one to her, and very serious she made it, till I almost
despaired of our ever coming to an understanding on the subject.

"On every other point she was unassuming almost to non-entity. She was
weak-minded to the verge of mental palsy. She was more benevolent in
deed, and more wandering in conversation, than any one I have met with
since. That is, in ordinary life. In the greenhouse or garden (with
which she and the head-gardener alone had any real acquaintance) her
accurate and profound knowledge would put to shame many professed
garden botanists I have met with since. From her I learnt what little
I know of the science of horticulture, and with her I spent many happy
hours over the fine botanical works in the manor library, which she
alone ever opened.

"And so I became reconciled to things as they were, though to this day
I connect with that shade of _feuille-morte_ satin a disappointment
not to be forgotten."

* * * * *

"It is a dull story, is it not, Ida?" said the little old lady,
pausing here. She had not told it in precisely these words, but this
was the sum and substance of it.

Ida nodded. Not that she had thought the story dull, so far as she had
heard it, and whilst she was awake; but she had fallen asleep, and so
she nodded.

Mrs. Overtheway looked back at the fire, to which, indeed, she had
been talking for some time past.

"A child's story?" she thought. "A tale of the blind, wilful folly of
childhood? Ah, my soul! Alas, my grown-up friends! Does the moral
belong to childhood alone? Have manhood and womanhood no passionate,
foolish longings, for which we blind ourselves to obvious truth, and
of which the vanity does not lessen the disappointment? Do we not
still toil after rosebuds, to find _feuilles-mortes_?"

No voice answered Mrs. Overtheway's fanciful questions. The hyacinth
nodded fragrantly on its stalk, and Ida nodded in her chair. She was
fast asleep--happily asleep--with a smile upon her face