ery sulkily.

'What made you treat me so, little Gwenny?' I asked, for Lorna would not
ask lest the reply should vex me.

'Because 'ee be'est below her so. Her shanna' have a poor farmering
chap, not even if her were a Carnishman. All her land, and all her
birth--and who be you, I'd like to know?'

'Gwenny, you may go,' said Lorna, reddening with quiet anger; 'and
remember that you come not near me for the next three days. It is the
only way to punish her,' she continued to me, when the maid was gone, in
a storm of sobbing and weeping. 'Now, for the next three days, she will
scarcely touch a morsel of food, and scarcely do a thing but cry. Make
up your mind to one thing, John; if you mean to take me, for better for
worse, you will have to take Gwenny with me.

'I would take you with fifty Gwennies,' said I, 'although every one
of them hated me, which I do not believe this little maid does, in the
bottom of her heart.'

'No one can possibly hate you, John,' she answered very softly; and I
was better pleased with this, than if she had called me the most noble
and glorious man in the kingdom.

After this, we spoke of ourselves and the way people would regard us,
supposing that when Lorna came to be her own free mistress (as she must
do in the course of time) she were to throw her rank aside, and refuse
her title, and caring not a fig for folk who cared less than a fig-stalk
for her, should shape her mind to its native bent, and to my perfect
happiness. It was not my place to say much, lest I should appear to use
an improper and selfish influence. And of course to all men of common
sense, and to everybody of middle age (who must know best what is good
for youth), the thoughts which my Lorna entertained would be enough to
prove her madness.

Not that we could not keep her well, comfortably, and with nice clothes,
and plenty of flowers, and fruit, and landscape, and the knowledge of
our neighbours' affairs, and their kind interest in our own. Still this
would not be as if she were the owner of a county, and a haughty title;
and able to lead the first men of the age, by her mind, and face, and
money.

Therefore was I quite resolved not to have a word to say, while this
young queen of wealth and beauty, and of noblemen's desire, made her
mind up how to act for her purest happiness. But to do her justice, this
was not the first thing she was thinking of: the test of her judgment
was only this, 'How will my love be happ