I add to it the crossing of a glacier?"

"No, no," said Lois, laughing; "do you think I am so insatiable? But--"

"Would you like it all, my darling?"

"Like it? Don't speak of liking," she said, with a quick breath of
excitement. "But--"

"Well? But--what?"

"We are not going to live to ourselves?" She said it a little anxiously
and eagerly, almost pleadingly.

"I do not mean it," he answered her, with a smile. "But as to this
journey my mind is entirely clear. It will take but a few months. And
while we are wandering over the mountains, you and I will take our
Bibles and study them and our work together. We can study where we stop
to rest and where we stop to eat; I know by experience what good times
and places those are for other reading; and they cannot be so good for
any as for this."

"Oh! how good!" said Lois, giving a little delighted and grateful
pressure to the hand in which her own still lay.

"You agree to my plans, then?"

"I agree to--part. What is that?"--for a slight noise was heard in the
hall.--"O Philip, get up!--get up!--there is somebody coming!"

Mr. Dillwyn rose now, being bidden on this wise, and stood confronting
the doorway, in which presently appeared his sister, Mrs. Burrage. He
stood quiet and calm to meet her; while Lois, hidden by the back of the
great easy-chair, had a moment to collect herself. He shielded her as
much as he could. A swift review of the situation made him resolve for
the present to "play dark." He could not trust his sister, that if the
truth of the case were suddenly made known to her, she would not by her
speech, or manner, or by her silence maybe, do something that would
hurt Lois. He would not risk it. Give her time, and she would fit
herself to her circumstances gracefully enough, he knew; and Lois need
never be told what had been her sister-in-law's first view of them. So
he stood, with an unconcerned face, watching Mrs. Burrage come down the
room. And she, it may be said, came slowly, watching him.

CHAPTER XLVIII.

ANNOUNCEMENTS.

I have never described Mr. Dillwyn; and if I try to do it now, I am
aware that words will give to nobody else the image of him. He was not
a beauty, like Tom Caruthers; some people declared him not handsome at
all, yet they were in a minority. Certainly his features were not
according to classical rule, and criticism might find something to say
to every one of them; if I except the shape and air of the face a