She blushed and shivered with anger, and in a flash she stooped and whipped a knife from her garter. But she shrugged her shoulders and let her armed hand fall by her side. "How stoopid!" she said wearily. "I come fetch you to the tan. It was Bosswel Leeke," her voice sank low. "Bosswel," she whispered the name, "he says the plastramengoes nab you; he say he come fetching you; he say he see you eat-drink with dam' plastramengoes—he say you one plastramengo yourself!

"He's a liar-as well as a thief and a coward!"

Bosswel not want me come see. He not want you-Bosswel want himself take Dahlia away. I say non so; I not believe-I say you not one plastramengo; I say I shall come see. I say the plastramengoes not know me, they shall me think one gypsy blowen-not sister of-Aldo." She whispered the

name.

The sister of Aldo! The yeoman's face grew hot; he drew sharply away from the girl. "Aldo's sister," he breathed. . . . “Well, all I can say is, I didn't know -I didn't even know he'd got a sister-much more it was you.... All I can say is, I ask your pardon."

Ah, ah! you did think Flamenca one blowen! But no; Flamenca is like a demoiselle.

live in a convent like one nun.”

Five year I

"But you aren't a nun-you can't be else you wouldn't be here?"

She eyed him mockingly. "You not want Flamenca be a nun?"

"No," he said. "I don't; though I don't know why I shouldn't-it's little to me."

" C'est que j'étais une sœur converse, moi-for one year."

'What's that mean? I don't understand the lingo." “Ah, ah, I shall you tell, one time. . . . Now I go; waiting for you there." With a wave of the tips of her fingers towards the Crossways end of the gorge, she was gone from the porch. Flittingly, dancingly, the sunlight smiting the red of her bodice and brightening the faded violet dye of her skirt, she went her way-a fortune-telling gypsy lass to any eye but his. He watched her till the bend of the dale received her from his view.

A lonely sense of loss took him as the swaying skirts flicked out of sight at the corner. "I'm a jollocks!" he muttered. "What's the lass to me?" Glumly he picked up his neglected pipe, crammed it with tobacco, and went to the kitchen for a light. The landlord and the cook-maid slept there peacefully still. "I'm a jollocks!" the yeoman informed himself again; while, puffing his consolation, he none the less grew testy at Mr. Chilcutt's brief delay; and his glumness lasted as they walked together down the dale.

"Sorter shovin' my neb inter yer affairs agin," the American drawled at the end of a spell of silence.

"The girl's nowt to me," said Matt. "Never saw her afore."

Mr. Chilcutt winked; so to speak, he winked at himself. "A man soon gits friendly with a spry hahnsome female. Putty little piece," he added affectionately; "Putty little piece!"

But there was no reply.

'Jeruel C.'s no slouch, Squire--putty most gen❜ally he knows when his comp'ny ain't wanted. Say the word an' I'm back. On'y, I'd like to git my nigger fust."

"Yes, yes; you come along and besides, you stuck to me over those runners."

"Sho!

Don't valy them constibles a red cent. Stick by ye the hull endurin' time, Squire. Fact is, can't find my folks, an' feelin' kinder lonesomeorphin in a furrin' land."

"Yes," the yeoman said; and there was silence again.

'Got suthin' on your mind, Squire?"

"Belike I have."

'Gypsies, I guess. 'Pears to know a sight about them varmint."

"I do," growled Matt; "I'd ought to. A cousin o' mine's wed to one of 'em, dall him!"

"I swan!" Mr. Chilcutt put profound emphasis on the words. "Wanter know!

it! Merried your cousin, did he?

Silence again.

Kinder s'picioned

I swan!"

"Say, Squire!" the man from Delaware went on presently; "stuck by ye, didn't I? See ye through this, too, if it's a bargain!"

"If what's a bargain?" Matt puffed at his pipe vehemently.

Squar' deals, Squire; see you through this biz, if ye'll help me find my folks. Don' mind goin' shucks in the prop'ty. Air it a bargain?

"No, no, friend," Matt muttered. "Mine's dangerous business, mine is-and-and-anyway, you needn't stop long in Stoniton, for yon's your nigger. See him, poor beggar?" and the yeoman broke into a harsh laugh.

"I swan!"

187

CHAPTER XVIII.

TELLS OF THE DISCOVERY OF COPERNICUS.

The world is a comedy to those who think, a tragedy to those who feel.

-Letter to Sir Horace Mann.

-Peveril of the Peak, xvi.

Hold out your dew-beaters till I take off the darbies.

With that she bent her snow-white knee,

Down by the shepherd kneeled she,

And him she sweetly kissed.

-Dowsabel.

I was going to begin with the millions of my fellow-creatures born to no inheritance but slavery; but finding, however affecting the picture was, that I could not bring it near me, and that the multitude of sad groups in it did but distract me, I took a single captive, and having first shut him up in his dungeon, I then looked through the twilight of his grated door to take his picture.

-A Sentimental Journey.

Grand, gloomy, and peculiar, he sat upon the throne a sceptred hermit, wrapped in the solitude of his own originality.

-The Character of Napoleon.

Her very frowns are fairer far

Than smiles of other maidens are.

-She is not Fair.