ir, and would have passed on with a slight remark,
but he turned with her, and finding she had dismissed the carriage,
intending to walk home, he requested permission to attend her. Mary
declined; but snatching up his hat, and whistling his dogs, he set out
with her in spite of her remonstrances to the contrary.

"If you persist in refusing my attendance," said he, "you will inflict an
incurable wound upon my vanity. I shall suspect you are ashamed of being
seen in such company. To be sure, myself, with my shabby jacket and my
spattered dogs, do form rather a ruffian-like escort; and I should not
have dared to have offered my services to a fine lady; but you are not a
fine lady, I know;" and he gently drew her arm within his as they began
to ascend a hill.

This was the first time Mary had found herself alone with Colonel
Lennox since that fatal day which seemed to have divided them for ever.
At first she felt uneasy and embarrassed, but there was so much good
sense and good feeling in the tone of his conversation--it was so far
removed either from pedantry or frivolity, that all disagreeable ideas
soon gave way to the pleasure she had in conversing with one whose turn
of mind seemed so similar to her own; and it was not till she had parted
from him at the gate of Beech Park she had time to wonder how she could
possibly have walked two miles _tete-a-tete_ with a man whom she
had heard solicited to love her!

From that day Colonel Lennox's visits insensibly increased in length
and number; but Lady Emily seemed to appropriate them entirely to
herself; and certainly all the flow of his conversation, the brilliancy
of his wit, were directed to her; but Mary could not but be conscious
that his looks were much oftener riveted on herself, and if his
attentions were not such as to attract general observation, they were
such as she could not fail of perceiving and being unconsciously
gratified by.

"How I admire Charles Lennox's manner to you, Mary," said her cousin,
"after the awkward dilemma you were both in. It was no easy matter to
know how to proceed; a vulgar-minded man would either have oppressed you
with his attentions, or insulted you by his neglect, while he steers so
gracefully free from either extreme; and I observe you are the only
woman upon whom he designs to bestow _les petits soins._ How I despise a
man who is ever on the watch to pick up every silly Miss's fan or glove
that she thinks it pretty to drop! No