I had to leave off writing to get ready for my journey, and now I am home again. What Harry had said in his telegram I did not know, but I saw from Janey's face, when she met me at the station, that she guessed something was wrong. She said very little as we walked home in the summer twilight-wild roses shedding perfume-nightingales singing-the evening star shining-everything peaceful but my heart. Janey whispered, as we reached the little garden gate, "Lucy, darling, let us say as little as we can to frighten father. He is much feebler than when you were here last.”

"Did Harry tell you-all?" I asked.

"Hush, there is father," she said, and the next moment I was in my father's arms, and he was crying partly from joy to see me again and partly from some vague suspicion that I had come because I was in trouble. We sat down to supper, as usual, in the homely little parlour, all three trying to be cheerful. After prayers-which Janey read now because of our father's failing voice-he blessed us both, and said to me :

"Trust in God, Lolo "—my pet home-name-" and do your duty to your husband, then all will come right in time."

"Father suspects that you and Harry have quarrelled," Janey said, when we were alone in the little old-fashioned bed room we had occupied as children. "Oh! Lolo, is that so?"

Harry, then, had not told her. For a moment I hesitated—but for a moment only. I could not deceive my sister Janey, who had loved me from childhood with a perfect love; and with cheek laid to cheek, and arms entwined, we sat together and I confessed all. Janey, instead of reproaching, tried to comfort and strengthen me by holding out a hope of atonement and reconciliation. She said she was sure that Harry would soon forgive if he saw me determined to amend, and she blamed me, though in the tenderest manner, for not having prepared him by a letter, instead of permitting him to come home buoyed up with hope and expectation. "No man," she said, could help feeling it hard that the very good fortune he had longed for, when put within hand's reach, should be dashed aside, perhaps for ever, by his own wife-especially a wife who owes all to her husband, as you do." Janey went on in the same tone of quiet reproach. “Think how penniless you went to Harry, and how generous he was. Why, even your wedding gown was his gift, and in everything he behaved as liberally as a man could do. But you can help him to get clear of difficulties. Send back that twenty pounds to begin with; we are rich enough to entertain our Lolo, and perhaps you and I may even devise some plan of earning a little."

With these last comforting words she left me, and after having written for an hour I feel as if I could go to sleep. When I am happy again I shall not want to keep a diary, but during Harry's absence I feel it like a friend in sympathy with me. I dared not speak of my troubles to any one. If things never do come right between us two I will keep what I have written, and Harry will read it when I am dead and forgive me.

so on.

June 28th.

How dreary and unfamiliar seems the old home life to me now! What happens one day happens the next, and no more important event ever takes place than an invitation to the neighbouring rectory or a village funeral. I wonder at Janey's cheerfulness as she gets up every morning to the same dull round of duties-helping in the Sunday school, reading to the old women, attending to her garden, and She never seems to think that there is another world outside this a world of bouquets and music, balls and operas; and looks distressed whenever I recall it. "Try to make yourself happy with simple pleasures," she says to me again and again, "and in helping others. There is the secret of a really contented mind." What simple pleasures can I make myself happy with? And what can I do to help others-I mean Harry? Janey has racked her brain to discover some method of earning money, and the only one we have hit upon will bring in just twenty-five pounds a year—that is, by having the little girls of some neighbours here every day to teach. At first Janey would not hear of my helping her; Harry would be vexed, she said; but I insisted upon teaching music, for which Harry had given me masters in London; and now we teach three dull children every morning for the sake of ten shillings a week! The only thing I can smile at is the contrast between our ambition and our achievement. I dare not let poor

Janey see this, for she is always hopeful.

I wish I could be happy, but I never wake in the morning without longing that the day was already at an end. We have prayers at eight o'clock, then breakfast, teach and do parish work till dinner-time, after which we sit in the summer-house with our books and needlework. On Sundays we put on our best clothes and go twice to church. This is our ordinary life, and in spite of father's kindness and Janey's devotion, I weary of it-I almost hate it.

And all this time Harry does not write!

To-night Janey came into our room pale and trembling. I was sitting on the bed in the twilight-we go to bed so early that we

want no candles-thinking how much pleasanter it would be to be dressing for a ball at that hour, when she sat down beside me and began to cry.

"Lolo," she said, "father knows all. I have tried to keep it from him, but he heard something that awakened his suspicions when at the rector's this afternoon, and on being questioned I could not deceive him."

My heart sank within me; to have Harry bitter and unforgiving seemed punishment enough. Janey went on, very sadly :—

"I never told father anything except that you and Harry had got into money difficulties and had not been quite happy together of late, and he naturally guessed it was your husband who was in the wrong. You he never suspected-his youngest, his favourite." Here she clasped me close with many kisses. "But now there is nothing to conceal, Lolo, and we must bear his sorrow as best we can."

"Is he very angry ?" I asked.

"Oh, Lolo! was our father ever angry with us when we did wrong as children? He is grieved and ashamed, that is all. He says that he can never lift up his head again."

"Janey, let me go away. I will ask Harry to take me in, or I will earn my living as a governess. I will beg in the streets rather than bring disgrace upon you all."

"As if we minded disgrace or anything so long as we could make things right between you two! Do you think Harry would accept aid from him?" Janey asked, in a timid voice.

"Never, never!"

pounds he has saved up, besides a Don't you think you could perfrom us? It is so very little."

Because there is the hundred small sum deposited in the bank. suade Harry to take this little help "I will not ask him," I answered. of all the money you have in the world. to do that."

"It would be mean to rob you No, Janey, don't want me

Janey said no more, and we went to bed, but I think neither of us got much sleep that night. The next morning was Sunday, such a perfect summer Sunday that it seemed as if every one must be happy! The birds were singing, the roses were out, the soft tinted clouds were sailing across the bright blue sky; the bells were ringing. As I opened my window, I saw father walking about the garden with his head bent down drearily. I dressed as fast as I could, and went down to him.

He kissed me as usual, and said he was tired. Would I sit down in the summer-house with him till breakfast was ready? We sat VOL. X., N.S. 1873.

down, Janey kissing her hand to us from the breakfast-parlour, which she was putting in order.

"Dear Janey!" father said; "never was a more devoted child than she." Then he turned to me and said, as if apologising for what looked like reproach, “And you, Lolo, have always been good to your father." We clasped each other's hands, and were both full of thoughts we hardly knew how to utter. At last father began, now in a voice that was heavy with tears:

"You must try henceforth to be as good to your husband, my dear. I don't ask more of you "

"Oh, father! How can I make amends for what I have done? and if I could, Harry would never forgive me."

"Lolo, I know it is very hard to make amends for wrong doing; but amends must be made-first to God, then to our fellow-creatures, without thinking of their forgiveness towards ourselves. husband has indeed cause to be angry."

Your

"But surely not to be angry always, father?" I said, passionately. "What I did was done without thinking; I never meant to ruin him." "It is no excuse for sin that we rush into it, wilfully blind to the consequences."

"Oh! father, do you call my folly a sin?"

;

"Folly is sin," father went on, "and the least wise of us have rules of conduct imprinted on our hearts by God that we cannot violate without knowing it. But I do not want to chide you, Lolo I only want you to see that your husband's anger is justifiable." "How can I soften it ?" I cried in the same vehement tone. "He does not write, he does not come, he gives me no opportunity of telling him what I feel"

"Listen, Lolo, I have thought of a plan for bringing you two together again. I have made up my mind to go to London tomorrow morning, taking what money I have with me. I shall see your husband; I shall tell him-shall I not?-that you want to go back to him, to share his anxieties and privations, and to be henceforth his good, true, helpful wife."

Here Janey called us to breakfast, and nothing more was said then about the proposed journey till I told her of it on our way to church. She merely said :

"Father is sure to do what is kind and wise."

Then we went through the day's duties as usual, teaching the catechism in the Sunday school, Janey leading the choir, I playing the harmonium; then coming home to cold dinner afterwards, and quiet reading in the garden. On the whole it was a cheerful day.

Monday. My father set off to London early this morning, Janey and I carrying his cloak and bag to the station. He persisted in travelling third-class, nodding adieu to us quite cheerfully from the hot, dusty, crowded carriage. We walked home without speaking. I do not know, as little could Janey guess, all that I feared. We did not say a word about father's errand throughout the day. And what a long day it was! Our little scholars had a holiday, so we had only parish work and the housekeeping to attend to. Whilst Janey went her rounds I ironed our muslin dresses and father's shirts, and after dinner she asked me to play to her. I flew joyfully to the old piano, for music was now my only pleasure, and, quite forgetting poor Janey's favourite pieces, practised some new music till she called me to her. The long afternoon was gone!

"What extraordinary music you have been playing," Janey said, good-naturedly, "but I must have my tunes after tea all the same." We had quite a happy evening, and did not go to bed till late. There seemed so many things to talk about on that first evening we had been alone since my marriage. The next morning I was up and dressed by six o'clock, wondering how the hours would pass till our father's return at midday. Janey proposed that, as she had a little shopping to do at Bridgewood, our market town, we should walk there directly after breakfast, and accompany father home by rail. I caught at the idea joyfully, and by eight o'clock we set off on our three-mile walk.

How welcome seemed the stir and noise of even quiet little Bridgewood after the seclusion of the last few weeks! But as we passed the gay shop-windows, displaying jewellery, bonnets, and shawls, I turned suddenly cold and sick, remembering that for such trumpery as this I had made myself, and all dear to me, ashamed and unhappy. When we reached the station, however, and I caught a glimpse of father's white head in a third-class compartment, I ran towards it with a feeling of hope.

We had just time to find seats when the train moved off. The carriage was crowded, and we were separated from father, so that talking was out of the question; and what with the heat, noise, and discomfort, I almost forgot my suspense. When we got out father asked for a little water, and we took him into the station-master's parlour, as he seemed quite overcome with the heat. "I am afraid the journey to London this weather has been too much for the vicar," the good station-master said, anxiously. "Had we not better borrow Mr. Jones's gig to drive him to the vicarage?"

"No, no, thank you; indeed, I am quite refreshed," father said, and