thinking that the spy for Mr Frank Marvale's interest had an eye kept
pretty open for his own; but watching the proceedings of people who
would be fifty times better pleased if the race of Paul Prys were
extinct, is very tiresome, and I soon took leave. The ladies betook
themselves to their room at the same time, and the young men walked
alongside of my pony down to the village inn. As we went, Mr Percy
Marvale was loud in his praises of all the inhabitants of Howkey--from
the half-drowned sire to the youngest of the children; so it is not to
be supposed that Sibylla and Monimia were omitted in his eulogies. I
remarked that he made no allusion to red hair or squinting, and that
Frank himself said nothing against his extravagant laudations of
Monimia's beauty. As little did he say any thing in corroboration. Was
silence a tribute to his old love, or the ominous commencement of a new?
One whole day he had been with her--a week, perhaps, was before him, of
constant association. How difficult for a young fellow to continue deaf
and blind to soft tones and softer glances, that spoke in reality of
herself, though professedly they were all about her father!

Next day Monimia was still further recovered, and her venerated governor
not yet fit to be moved. It was so bright and sunny that it would have
been a shame to stay in doors, and Frank accompanied the lively Monimia
into the garden. Oh! the running to and fro, the reaching up of the
white arm, and standing on tiptoe to get at the fruit-trees on the
wall--the merry laugh, the conscious looks, the blushing cheek--if Frank
isn't made of stone, he'll yield to a certainty. She trips over all the
beds with a wicker-basket on her arm to gather flowers, and clips them
off so gracefully, and arranges them so tastefully, and all to be
presented to the gallant deliverer of her papa. She is already on her
way back, having achieved a nosegay of surpassing sweetness, when Mr
Percy Marvale hurries out of the library window with a letter in his