daintily-neat attire, as she arranged cups and saucers for seven
people upon the waiter before her, instructing the butler, at the
same time, to ring the bell again for those she was to serve. She
was very busy and happy at that date. The neighborhood was gay,
after the open-hearted, open-handed style of hospitality that
distinguished the brave old days of Virginia plantation-life. A
merry troup of maidens and cavaliers visited by invitation one
homestead after another, crowding bedrooms beyond the capacity of
any chambers of equal size to be found in the land, excepting in a
country house in the Old Dominion; surrounding bountiful tables with
smiling visages and restless tongues; dancing, walking, driving, and
singing away the long, warm days, that seemed all too short to the
soberest and plainest of the company; which sped by like dream-hours
to most of the number.

Winston Aylett, owner and tenant of the ancient mansion of
Ridgeley--the great house of a neighborhood where small houses and
men of narrow means were infrequent--had gone North about the first
of June, upon a tour of indefinite length, but which was certainly
to include Newport, the lakes, and Niagara, and was still absent.
His aunt, Mrs. Sutton, and his only sister, Mabel, did the honors of
his home in his stead, and, if the truth must be admittbd, more
acceptably to their guests than he had ever succeeded in doing. For
a week past, the house had been tolerably well filled--ditto Mrs.
Sutton's hands; ditto her great, heart. Had she not three love
affairs, in different but encouraging stages of progression, under
her roof and her patronage! And were not all three, to her
apprehension, matches worthy of Heaven's making, and her
co-operation? A devout Episcopalian, she was yet an unquestioning
believer in predestination and "special Providences"--and what but