famous
old cathedral, neighboured by the romantic ivy-grown walls of a ruined
castle, soars up from the centre of the town, and dominates the whole
survey--calm, as with conscious power. Nearing the town, the villas of
merchants and traders, released perhaps from business, skirt the road,
with trim gardens and shaven lawns. Now the small river, or rather
rivulet, of Ouzel, from which the town takes its name, steals out from
deep banks covered with brushwood or aged trees, and widening into brief
importance, glides under the arches of an ancient bridge; runs on, clear
and shallow, to refresh low fertile dairy-meadows, dotted with kine; and
finally quits the view, as brake and copse close round its narrowing,
winding way; and that which, under the city bridge, was an imposing
noiseless stream, becomes, amidst rustic solitudes, an insignificant
babbling brook.

From one of the largest villas in these charming suburbs came forth
a gentleman, middle-aged, and of a very mild and prepossessing
countenance. A young lady without a bonnet, but a kerchief thrown over
her sleek dark hair, accompanied him to the garden-gate, twining both
hands affectionately round his arm, and entreating him not to stand in
thorough draughts and catch cold, nor to step into puddles and wet his
feet, and to be sure to be back before dark, as there were such shocking
accounts in the newspapers of persons robbed and garotted even in the
most populous highways; and, above all, not to listen to the beggars
in the street, and allow himself to be taken in; and before finally
releasing him at the gate, she buttoned his greatcoat up to his chin,
thrust two pellets of cotton into his ears, and gave him a parting kiss.
Then she watched him tenderly for a minute or so as he strode on with
the step of a man who needed not all those fostering admonitions and
coddling cares.

As soon as he was out of sight of the lady and the windows of the villa,
the gentleman cautiously unbuttoned his greatcoat, and removed the
cotton from his ears. "She takes much after her mother, does Anna
Maria," muttered the gentleman; "and I am very glad she is so well
married."

He had not advanced many paces when, from a branchroad to the right that
led to the railway station, another gentleman, much younger, and whose
dress unequivocally bespoke him a minister of our Church, came suddenly
upon him. Each with surprise recognised the other.

"What!--Mr. George Morley!"

"Mr. Harto