"It is a very long one," remarked Miss Carlyle, grimly surveying it.

Barbara was to sit in the Carlyle pew that day, for she thought the
farther she was from the justice the better; there was no knowing but he
might take a sly revengeful cut at the feather in the middle of service,
and so dock its beauty. Scarcely were they seated when some strangers
came quietly up the aisle--a gentleman who limped as he walked, with a
furrowed brow and gray hair; and a young lady. Barbara looked round
with eagerness, but looked away again; they could not be the expected
strangers, the young lady's dress was too plain--a clear-looking muslin
dress for a hot summer's day. But the old beadle in his many-caped coat,
was walking before them sideways with his marshalling baton, and he
marshaled them into the East Lynne pew, unoccupied for so many years.

"Who in the world can they be?" whispered Barbara to Miss Carlyle. "That
old stupid is always making a mistake and putting people into the wrong
places."

"The earl and Lady Isabel."

The color flushed into Barbara's face, and she stared at Miss Corny.
"Why, she has no silks, and no feathers, and no anything!" cried
Barbara. "She's plainer than anybody in the church!"

"Plainer than any of the fine ones--than you, for instance. The earl is
much altered, but I should have known them both anywhere. I should have
known her from the likeness to her poor mother--just the same eyes and
sweet expression."

Aye, those brown eyes, so full of sweetness and melancholy; few who had