"Yes-a fine house."

"His old aunt lives there-Mistress Hamilton. She used to come here just for the summer, and bring a number of visitors with her; but latterly she has stayed here most of the time, unless when she is ordered to some Spa or other. She says no air agrees with her like this. He is her heir. She makes a tremendous work with him; I believe he is the only living thing she cares for in the world. He mostly spends his holidays with her, and whiles, when she's more ailing than usual, he comes down from London on the Friday night, and goes up again on the Sunday night."

"He can't have a very large practice in London, surely, if he can do that."

"He's not rightly practising at all, yet. He has been a doctor for some years, but he is studying for something else. I don't understand it myself. But he is very clever; he gave me some powders that cured my rheumatism in a few days, when Dr Burns had been working away half the winter with lotions and fomentations, and lime-juice, and-"

"-alkalies," thought Mona. "Much more scientific treatment than the empirical use of salicin."

For Mona was young and had never suffered from rheumatism.

"It's

“——and bandages and that," concluded Rachel. some time now since I've seen him. His aunt has been away at Strathpeffer all the summer, and the house has been shut up."

"But I have still another customer to account for;" and in some fear and trembling, Mona told the story of the scullery-maid and her bonnet.

"My word!" said Rachel, "you gave yourself a deal of trouble. I don't see that it matters what they wear, and the hats pay better. Young folks will be young, you know, and for my part I

December."

don't see why May should go like

Mona sighed. "Perhaps I was wrong," she said; "I

don't think it is a common fault of mine to be too ready to interfere with other people; but the girl looked so quiet and sensible, in spite of her trumpery clothes. Servants never used to dress like that; but perhaps, like a child, I have been building a little sand-dyke to prevent the tide from coming in."

"What I can't see is, why you should trouble yourself about what they wear. One would think, to hear you talk, that it was a question of honesty or religion like."

Mona sighed again, and then laughed a little bitterly. "No doubt the folks here could instruct me in matters of honesty and religion," she said; "but I did fancy this morning that I could teach that child a thing or two about her bonnet."

"Oh, well, I daresay she'll be in on Monday morning to say she's thought better of it."

There was a long silence, and then Rachel went on, "My dear, how ever did you come by that extraordinary name? I never heard the like of it. They called your mother Margaret, didn't they?"

"Yes, Margaret is my own second name, but I never use it. So long as a name is distinctive, the shorter it is, the better."

"H'm. It would have been a deal wiser-like if you'd left out the Mona. I can't bring it over my tongue at all." And in fact, as long as Mona lived with her cousin, she was constrained to answer to the appellation of "my dear." "My dear," said Rachel now, "I don't think I ever heard what church you belong to."

Mona started. "I was brought up in the Church of England," she said.

"Surely your father never belonged to the Church of England?"

"He usually attended the church service out in India with my mother. I don't think he considered himself, strictly speaking, a member of any individual church, although he was a very religious man."

"Ay. I've heard that he wasn't exactly sound."

"I fancy he would be considered absolutely sound nowa-days,—

'For in this windy world,

What's up is faith, what's down is heresy.'"

Rachel looked puzzled. "Oh!" she said with sudden comprehension. "No, no, you mustn't say that. Truth is always the same.'

"From the point of view of Deity, no doubt; but to us poor 'minnows in the creek' every wave is practically a fresh creation."

"I wish you'd been brought up a Baptist," said Rachel uneasily. "It's all so simple and definite, and there's Scripture for everything we believe. You must have a talk with the minister. He's a grand Gospel preacher, and great at discussions on Baptist principles."

"Dear cousin," said Mona, "five years ago I should have enjoyed nothing better than such a discussion, but it seems to me now that silence is best. The faith we argue about is rarely the faith we live by; and if it is-so much the worse for our lives."

"But how are we to learn any better if we don't talk?" 'Surely it is by silence that we learn the best things. It was from the loneliness of the Mount that Moses brought down the tables of stone."

There's many

"I don't see what that has to do with it. a one in the town has been brought round to sound Baptist principles by a sermon, or an argument on the subject. I believe you've no notion, my dear, how the whole Bible, looked at in the right way, points to the fact that the Baptists hold the true doctrine and practice. There's Philip and the Eunuch, and the Paschal Lamb-no, that's the plan of salvation, and the passage of the Red Sea, and the true meaning of the Greek word translated 'baptise.' We'd a missionary preaching here last Sabbath, and he said he had not the smallest doubt that China, in common with the

whole world, would eventually become Baptist. That was how he put it-'eventually become Baptist.'

"A consummation devoutly to be wished,' no doubt," said Mona, "but did the missionary point out in what respect the world would be the 'forrader'?"

A moment later she would have given anything to recall the words. They had slipped out almost involuntarily, and besides, she had never lived in a Dissenting circle, and she had no conception how very real Rachel's Baptist principles were to her, nor how she longed to witness the surprise of the "many mighty and many wise," when, contrary to their expectations, they beheld the whole world "eventually become Baptist."

"Forgive me, dear," said Mona. "I did not mean to hurt you, I am only stupid; I don't understand these things."

"To my mind," said Rachel severely, "obedience to the revealed will of God is none the less a duty because our salvation does not actually depend upon it,-though I doubt not some difference will be made, at the last day, between those who saw His will and those who shut their eyes and hardened their hearts. I have a very low opinion of the Church of England myself, and Mr Stuart says the same." "Have you a Baptist Church here in Borrowness?" asked Mona, thinking it well to change the subject.

"No; though there are a good few Baptists. We walk over to Kirkstoun. I suppose you will be going to sit under Mr Ewing?"

"Who is he?"

"The English Church minister. His chapel is near Mrs Hamilton's house. He has not got the root of the matter in him at all. He's a good deal taken up by the gentry at the Towers; and he raises prize poultry,-queer-like occupation for a minister."

"If it will give you any pleasure," said Mona, with rash catholicity, "I will go to church with you every Sunday morning."

Rachel's rubicund face beamed.

"You will find it very quiet, after the fashionable service you're used to," she said; "but you'll hear the true Word of God there."

"That is saying much," said Mona rather drearily; "but I don't go to a fashionable church in London ;" and a pang of genuine home-sickness shot through her heart, as she thought of the dear, barn-like old chapel in Bloomsbury, whither she had gone Sunday after Sunday in search of "beautiful thoughts."

"You tactless brute," she said to herself as she set her candlestick on the dressing-table that evening, "if you have only come here to tread on that good soul's corns, the sooner you tramp back to London the better."

CHAPTER XIII.

THE CHAPEL.

The next morning the sun rose into a cloudless blue sky, and Mona found herself looking forward with pleasure to the walk into Kirkstoun. The road lay along the coast, and was separated from the sea by a stretch of yellow corn-fields. The inland scenery was flat and tame, but, after the massive grandeur of Norway, Mona's eye rested with quiet satisfaction on the smiling acres, cut into squares, like a giant's chess-board, by scraggy hedges and lichen-grown dykes.

They had gone about half-way, when a pleasant voice behind them said, "Good morning, Miss Simpson."

"Oh, good morning, doctor! My dear, this is Dr Dudley." He lifted his hat and accommodated his long ramshackle stride to Rachel's podgy steps.

"How goes the rheumatism?" he asked.