'How desperately early you are here!' said he, following her into the house.

Katharine Healey remained at the window gazing at the yellow moon, but with eyes so full of tears that she saw nothing distinctly. Those tears welled up faster and faster, and at last ran over.

She wiped them away, thinking, 'He had begun to kiss me like that, and to do kind little things like that. Oh, why had he only such a short time to be good to me?'

CHAPTER XVIII.

'And we will sit upon the rocks,

And watch the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers to whose falls

Melodious birds sing madrigals.'

-CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE.

HE next evening, Katharine, taking her way to the river, met Earnshaw coming from the post-office.

She stopped.

'When are you going to tell me all about Hamerton, Mr. Earnshaw ?'

'When you will now, unless you prefer to be alone.'

'Alone! Oh, no, indeed! I am going to my usual haunt. Will you come too?'

'Gladly;' and without another word they turned down the shady lane; and Katharine

at last had a companion by her side in the paths she had so often paced alone.

They scarcely spoke until they were seated. under the trees where she had sat last night. This evening her eyes were open to the peace and beauty of the scene; and she said

'Yes; I am very fond of this meadow; it has been my favourite spot ever since

'Since when?' asked she, seeing that he paused, and looked rather wistfully across the river.

'One evening, years ago,' said he 'an August evening like this-I had walked here, and was trying to forget my sorrow (for I had a sorrow) in a volume of Shakespeare. It was the Merry Wives of Windsor that I had accidentally opened upon. Of course

I had read it before: but I had somehow never noticed that bit as I ought to have done. It was where Sir Hugh sings snatches of Marlowe's sonnet

VOL. III.

and you know the rest; but it was those two perfect lines

'I know" shallow rivers." Yes; when I read them, I first knew you may enjoy an exquisite melody in black and white, and without a sound.'

'Somehow, then, they went right to my heart, or whatever it is that we feel with. It was evening, as it is now. I looked up,

and lo!'

He pointed to the prospect; and Katharine, gazing around, saw that the words and the scene were exactly matched.

'After that,' added Ughtred, 'this place was hallowed ground to me. I have loved it ever since.'

'I am glad you have told me about it. I like it.' Then, after a pause-Dare I ask

what the trouble was that had brought you here?"

My mother had been dead a week. She and I had lived together, and for each other, We had been all in all to

for many years.

each other, and she was an angel—my mother.

She surely must be an angel now.

I thought, could never be filled.'

Her place,

Oh, and has that idea been justified?' 'No, not exactly. First thoughts seldom are,' he answered, decapitating a tuft of daisies, and laying the stalkless heads in a row before him.

'And so this has become your favourite spot?'

'Yes. I think it ever will be.'

There was a pause, and then Katharine began an attempt to break the ice upon another subject-his own prospects. She had thought it would be very easy: what more simple than to ask him what his intentions were, and offer to help him in any and every