able in many ways,' answered Raymond gravely; but if you ask my opinion, and supposing the young lady is in favour of the application being made, it seems to me you have no option but to undertake it. Consider, sir, the position of this orphan girl in London, alone and unfriended, endeavouring to earn a scanty pittance by her pencil, while you, the nearest friend of her dead father, prosperous and in good position, do not stir a finger to help her. I am sorry to distress you, sir, but, believe me, I speak on your own account as much as upon hers; would not such a state of things, I say, give grounds, and apparently solid ones, for accusations which are now, thank Heaven, baseless and contemptible, but which in that case I, for my part, should blush to read?'

The expression of Ralph Pennicuick's face, who, at the commencement of this impassioned speech, had stared at his son with angry eyes, had wholly altered during its progress. It had worn such a look of mute appeal when Raymond painted Nelly's wretched condition, that you would have thought the description of it had pierced his listener's very heart (as indeed it did); and now, when Raymond spoke of what his own feelings would be if his father should refuse to urge Nelly's plea, should she herself desire it, it changed again to an expression of patient but pained submission.

'You are too impetuous, Raymond-far too impetuous, and you take advantage of my-what is the word?-yes, my failing health. But if the girl wishes it-mind that, if she really wishes it -and if you think it my duty, and if I am equal to it—you'll just write to Wardlaw for me and say that-if I am equal to it-the thing shall be done.-Now I think,' here his tones assumed their old petulance, you have done me enough of mischief for one morning,

and-oh, I have no doubt you didn't mean to kill me, but when one is out of health one doesn't want to be pulled down still lower by bad news and-and-disagreeable talk. And if you will kindly ring the bell, Raymond, Hatton will show you out.'

It was quite true that the young man's visit had done his father harm. When his son had left the room Ralph Pennicuick fell back in his chair as a dying man lies, at length, from sheer feebleness.

'They will kill me amongst them,' he murmured. 'I could never stand it-that speech in the House of Commons about him. It would be one lie from first to last. Alone and unfriended-a scanty pittance-and his daughter. It is frightful every way.' His face was so ghastly that, as he pulled out a drawer in the breakfast-table and produced a bottle, a looker-on would have said, 'Why, this man is going to put an end to his life.' It was, however, only some brandy, which he poured from the bottle into his cup of coffee, and drank with a trembling hand.

CHAPTER XVI.

A FRIEND IN NEED.

GRIEF, it is said, does not always disincline ladies to love; indeed, there is a famous classical story-I am not classical myself, only devout, and I have read it as it appears in Jeremy Taylorof a widow who, even while weeping over her husband's tomb, became filled with the tender passion for somebody else; and at all events, grief forbids mere flirtation and makes matters serious. So, in Miss Ellen Conway's case, though she never thought of Love, her very sorrows made her more accessible, as I have said, to one who, it was easy for anyone else but herself to see, had become her lover. To her the talk about her father and his fate was so incongruous with any notion of being courted,' that it did not occur to her that she was undergoing that operation; but Mr. Herbert Milburn was not for his part so overcome with melancholy but that he could think of other things than the Tomb-such as the Altar. Another thing, too, conduced to the young people being 'thrown together' more than would otherwise have been the case, namely, Miss Milburn's opposition. By Nelly it was simply disregarded; but dear Herbert' resented it exceedingly, and redoubled his attentions to his fair enslaver in consequence.

6

After a few weeks he was summoned to London again on

business for a day or two, and then it was for the first time that Nelly felt-through her sense of loss-how agreeable a companion he had been to her. If her mere affection for each had been weighed, it would probably have been found that she liked Mrs. Wardlaw much the better of the two; but then Milburn could sympathise with her, while her kind hostess could only pity and pet her. The young rogue affected to encourage her views of independence and artistic toil-though in his heart he intended to knock all such projects on the head by marrying her—while Mrs. Wardlaw utterly scoffed at them. She had no patience with such nonsense,' she said. 'What did Heaven send us friends for but to make use of them!'

There was a certain generous scorn about her, which I venture to think was as fine in its way as those Spartan precepts about living on a crust of one's own winning which Nelly preached, and indeed burnt to practise. She was getting convinced that her skill with her pencil was retrograding rather than improving, and that she must place herself under professional guidance.

In vain Mr. Herbert Milburn had recommended himself as a competent teacher. You draw no better than I do, sir, nor yet so well,' she had replied, which was quite true, as he laughingly acknowledged. Now that he was gone she missed his laugh, his gentle, earnest talk, and perhaps (though she would not have called it by that name) even his devotion.

More thoughtful than usual, but with her thoughts fixed on her future, not her past, she took her solitary way one afternoon along the shore. Some fancy-or it might be a disinclination to choose the favourite route that had so often been enlivened by Milburn's companionship-made her seek the southern bay, where the projecting cliffs were steep and high, and the beach level and sandy

without a stone. As she crossed the jetty she passed an artist at his work; his colour-box was on the stone step, and she inadvertently struck it with her foot. I beg your pardon, sir.'

'Nay, it was my fault, not yours,' said he.

The words were commonplace, but the voice attracted her by its exceeding gentleness. He was an old man-or rather looked like a man prematurely old; his brown hair and beard were plentifully streaked with grey, and his face was sharp and worn-as though it had been held to the grindstone by harsh Fate. His eyes, deep sunk in their sockets, flamed at her with an expression such as she had seen the hungry wear in sight of food exposed in shops, and which would have frightened her but for the softness of his speech. If the poor man looked mad-and that idea did strike her he certainly looked harmless. He was long past the time of life at which landscape painters are seen sitting about in the late autumn, even at Sandybeach, and, judged by his attire, was far from prosperous. Perhaps at his age, thought she, it might come to pass she might have met with the same ill-success, and wear as despairing looks as he did.

:

He had risen as she passed, but sat down at once again very hastily his shrunken limbs trembled excessively and seemed unable to support him. Nelly felt sorry for him, but her own sorrow presently monopolised her mind, and she forgot all about him; she forgot, too, the time, the place, and the warnings she had received not to linger in Blackness Bay during the spring tides. She was walking to and fro on the dry firm sand when suddenly she looked up and saw the two arms of the bay already projecting far into the sea, and the stern face of the sheer cliff cutting off her escape to landward. The wind was blowing fresh, and from the