d a bunch of oak-apples in one hand,
plainly the object of his climb, and was furtively watching Lady
Constantine with the hope that she might not see him. But that she had
already done, though she did not reveal it, and, fearing that the latter
words of their conversation had been overheard, they spoke not till they
had passed the next turning.

She stretched out her hand to his. 'This must not go on,' she said
imploringly. 'My anxiety as to what may be said of such methods of
meeting makes me too unhappy. See what has happened!' She could not
help smiling. 'Out of the frying-pan into the fire! After meanly
turning to avoid the parson we have rushed into a worse publicity. It is
too humiliating to have to avoid people, and lowers both you and me. The
only remedy is not to meet.'

'Very well,' said Swithin, with a sigh. 'So it shall be.'

And with smiles that might more truly have been tears they parted there
and then.

XV

The summer passed away, and autumn, with its infinite suite of tints,
came creeping on. Darker grew the evenings, tearfuller the moonlights,
and heavier the dews. Meanwhile the comet had waxed to its largest
dimensions,--so large that not only the nucleus but a portion of the tail
had been visible in broad day. It was now on the wane, though every
night the equatorial still afforded an opportunity of observing the
singular object which would soon disappear altogether from the heavens
for perhaps thousands of years.

But the astronomer of the Rings-Hill Speer was no longer a match for his
celestial materials. Scientifically he had become but a dim vapour of
himself; the lover had come into him like an armed man, and cast out the
student, and his intellectual situation was growing a life-and-death
matter.

The resolve of the pair had been so far kept: they had not seen each
other in private for three months. But on one day in October he ventured
to write a note to her:--

'I can do nothing! I have ceased to study, ceased to observe. The
equatorial is useless to me. This affection I have for you absorbs my
life, and outweighs my intentions. The power to labour in this
grandest of fields has left me. I struggle against the weakness till
I think of the cause, and then I bless her. But the very desperation
of my circumstances has suggested a remedy; and this I would inform
you of at once.

'Can you come to me, since I must not come to you? I w