renown at the concert had reached her; and thus the time was safely spent in singing till the carriage was announced, and good-nights exchanged.

Maura's eyes grew round with delight, and she jumped for joy at the preferment.

'Oh!' she said, as she fervently kissed Valetta, it is the most delightful evening I ever spent in the whole course of my life, except at Lady Merrifield's Christmas-tree! And now to go home in a carriage! I never went in one since I can remember!'

And Kalliope's 'Thank you,'we have enjoyed ourselves very much,' was very fervent.

Those young people are very superior to what I expected,' said Aunt Adeline. What fine creatures, all so handsome; and that

little Maura is a perfect darling.'

The Muse herself is very superior,' said Miss Mohun. One of those home heroines who do the work of Atlas without knowing it. I do not wonder that the marble girls speak of her so enthusiastically.'

How Gillian might have enjoyed all this, and yet she could not, except so far that she told herself that thus there could be no reasonable objection made by her aunts to intercourse with those whom they so much admired.

Yet perhaps even then she would have told all, but that, after having bound over Kalliope to secrecy, it would be awkward to confess that she had told all. It would be like owning herself in the wrong, and for that she was not prepared. Besides, where would be the secrecy of her great thing'?

(To be continued.)

DAGMAR.

BY HELEN SHIPTON, AUTHOR OF CAIRNFORTH,' ETC.'

Dagmar, Day's maiden,-she that loves the day,
The cheerful day, the light, the sun, the Truth.-H. S.

CHAPTER II.

THE LETTERS THAT CAME BY THE AFTERNOON POST.

'Open the shutter. Bright and sharp

The ray falls on those shrouded things,

A grand-piano and a harp,

Where no one ever plays or sings.'-W. ALLINGHAM.

THE next morning Raymond Dayrell awoke long before his usual time, and lay in a half-dream of conscious well-being, listening to the pleasant and unfamiliar voices of the country-the caw of the rooks in the elms below the great field, the rustle of the wind through the leaves, the murmurous voice of insects hovering in the warm yellow sunlight, the isolated note of small birds calling softly to each other. Presently he was aware of another voice down in the garden, clear and silvery, blending with the other voices of the September morning as if it belonged to their charm.

'As it fell out, one long summer day,

Two lovers they sat on a hill;

They sate together that long summer day,'
And could not talk their fill.',

There was a pause, and through the open window came up Dick's voice, clear and jubilant, shouting his morning greeting all across the garden. Then Day answered him, and presently it became evident that he was pelting her with dahlias, which she averred were full of earwigs. Raymond thought what a pretty picture they must be making, and that he would get up and see it; but before he could prevail upon himself to move, Day had begun to retaliate, and Dick had fled howling, and had betaken himself to the court-yard at the back of the house to look after his numerous family of pets.

The lull after the uproar was so complete that Raymond thought that Dagmar had gone too, but in a moment the sweet voice rose again, with a touch almost of heart-break in its clear tones.

'I will do more for thee, Margrete,

Than any of thy kin,

For I will kiss thy clay-cold lips,
Though there's nae breath within.'

'Good-morning,' shouted the Squire out of his bedroom window. 'Good-morning,' cried his daughter. Oh, papa, isn't it lovely? Make haste and come out, quick.'

The Squire's window closed with a bang, and the song went on again.

'Deal on, deal on, my merry men all,

Deal on the ale and wine,

For whatever you deal at her burial to-day

Shall be dealt to-morrow at mine.'

Raymond got up at last, and made his way down into the garden, to find Dagmar gathering up the dahlias which Dick had scattered. He would have come to her assistance, but she laughed him to scorn, showing her slender sunburnt fingers dyed all purple by the dahlias' decaying petals.

So, as he did not love to soil his own far whiter hands, Raymond stood still upon the side-walk, basking lazily in the warm sunshine and watching Day as she flitted about, sometimes in sunlight, sometimes in shade. She looked so bright and merry, so trim and dainty with her clean cotton dress and glossy waves of hair, that it was hard to connect her with those doleful verses of old-world tragedy which she had just been singing with such passion and pathos.

The Squire appeared on the steps of the garden-door, and she flew at him, hugged him, and darted indoors, vowing that she was starving. The Squire laughed, greeted his nephew, and accompanied him indoors more leisurely, stopping on the way to count the Jargonelle pears that grew against the sunny south wall.

The dining-room was all flowers and sunshine, and Mrs. Tyndal was seated behind the coffee-pot, with Agnes on one side of her, and on the other, Dagmar already at breakfast, like the nursery-queen, 'eating bread and honey.'

Mrs. Tyndal in her soft deep voice enquired very carefully after Raymond's comforts, looked distressed when he owned that he had a bad habit of not sleeping, and while he talked with her husband and Agnes, was evidently considering what could be done for him.

6

She made a mental memorandum of something which she could procure and persuade him to try, and then came back to present interest. Day, dearest,' she said, 'I wish you would go and find Dick. He will certainly be late with his lessons; and he really ought not to keep Mr. Layton waiting.'

'Does not Dick go to school now?' enquired Raymond.

'Not yet. We thought he was hardly strong enough to be sent away to a big school just yet. So Mr. Layton has kindly undertaken to give him two hours a day, and he has lessons to prepare besides.' The boy's being spoilt,-ruined!' said the Squire. He ought to go to school and rough it-do him good.'

་

'I know who was most against his going when the matter was

considered,' said Agnes, in her pleasant mocking tones.

Who was it

said that surely the house was big enough, and that it was a shame to send a poor little chap like that to school, to be bullied by all the big fellows?'

6

Well! well!' said the Squire, we should all miss the impudent little beggar, no doubt. And the women must have something to fret and fuss over. But he must mind his lessons better, or he'll

have to go.'

At this moment the delinquent entered, with his fair hair in much disorder, and his blue jacket white with dust. After him came Day, the letter-bag in one hand, and a bundle of letters in the other.

'Here's the bag,' she cried, and here are the letters that should have come yesterday. And one of them's a foreigner. But open the bag first, father darling, and see if there's one for me this morning.' There was not, and she sat down with a pout, keeping an interested look-out upon her father's correspondence, but returning to her bread and honey with undiminished appetite.

Mr. Tyndal took up first the letter which his daughter had called a foreigner. He read it through, then laid it down on the table] and looked at his wife.

'Well!' he said, with long-drawn emphasis; and everybody, as he had hoped and expected, looked up and said: What is it?'

'A piece of news-most astonishing news,' he said. 'Guess what it is, all of you.'

'I think I know,' said Mrs. Tyndal, reflectively. Mr. Poynter has lost his seat in Parliament. You said he was to be petitioned against, for bribery.'

Also her Majesty Queen Anne is dead,' murmured Dagmar. 'Mother dearest, that wouldn't be very great news, as far as we are concerned.'

'Good or bad?' asked Raymond.

'That's as they may turn out. At present they seem to me to be good news enough, interesting, at all events.'

'I know,' said Dagmar again. That letter was from Valparaiso, and you have only one correspondent in that part of the world. You have heard from the Myth-and he is coming home!'

'Right, little girl, for once,' said her father, taking up the letter again. It is from Maurice, and he is coming home directly. I thought that last letter of mine about the dilapidations at the Court would fetch him.'

'I am glad,' said Day, nodding. I am curious to see this Myth in the flesh. Not that I shall believe in his coming till he is actually here.'

'Maurice?' said Raymond, Maurice Claughton, do you mean?' 'Yes! my ward that was. I have never seen him since he was ten years old, and none of the folks about here for five years before that. He has been very tiresome in refusing to come home, and

putting off time after time; but I think now he has made up his mind to it once for all.'

'About five-and-twenty-no! six! He has of course been his own master for some years now; but by his request I have still taken an interest in his affairs, and kept an eye upon his bailiff, and the people who had charge of the Court. But really now the place wants a thorough doing up, and I wrote and told him that I would not undertake the responsibility. He must come and see to things himself now.'

'But what has made him so unwilling to come to England?'

What was his name?

'Who can say? There was his mother first; and then when she was gone he was to stay to finish his education. Then it was settled he was to see a little more of the world first, and come home for his coming of age. And then his friend stood in the way-poor fellow. Oh, yes!-Caryl. Caryl didn't choose to come to England, for some reason or other, and Maurice did not care to come without him. I let him have his fling for another year or two, and then pressed his coming home very strongly. They were in Egypt then, but he had just agreed to come over, at any rate for a time, when poor Caryl took a fever and died. And Maurice wrote me a heart-broken sort of letter, telling me to let everything slide, and went off to South America, and did not even write again for nearly a year. So there was no more talk of his coming home, till

now.'

Do you think he will stay here?' asked Mrs. Tyndal, thinking of the increased establishment which would be required at the Court, and of some village protégées of hers who might hope to be made under-gardeners or stable-boys.

I don't know. I fancy so, from what he says here. But he must be a queer fish; there is no saying what notion he may take into his head next.'

'I can't fancy what should make any one stay away so long from such a place as the Court,' said Agnes, with half a sigh.

Is it so beautiful then?' asked Raymond. 'I don't think I have ever seen it since I was old enough to know that Nature had any beauties or Art either.'

'You shall see it to-day, if you like,' said the Squire. I must go up there after lunch, to tell the folks to make some preparations for their master. You had better all of you come with me, and see what adornments and alterations you think the place requires. Then we shall have at least half a dozen different notions to perplex Maurice with when he returns.'

'When will he be here?' asked Dagmar.

'I don't know! He says "with all possible speed," and seems to think that I know, to an hour, how long a journey from Valparaiso will take.'