'And now I must really be going, my kind friends,' said Joshua. 'I shall not talk about my gratitude for your goodness to-day, though I do take it as a favour to myself; for you have done a Christian act, and will obtain your reward. I should like to say a few words to Cynthia before I go away.'

'Shall I call her ?'

'No; I'll go to the kitchen and see her there.'

He went into the passage, and opened the door at the end of it. The kitchen faced the west, and was all of a glow with the afternoon sun. Roses and honeysuckle garlanded the low wide casement, and pots of yellow musk upon the sill perfumed the warm air. The red-floored kitchen, the dresser with its array of brightly-coloured crockery and shining tin and copper, made a Dutch picture; and in the mellow light of the casement stood Cynthia, looking dreamily out into the garden-a garden that sloped upwards in a gentle incline to the tall hedge that divided it from the pastureland beyond. The hedges were white with elder-bushes in flower. There was a well in one corner, a pig-sty in another; and on a small square grass-plot in front of the kitchen-window a brood of soft yellow chicks were disporting themselves under the eye of a fussy Dorking hen.

I have come to bid you good-bye, Cynthia,' said Mr. Haggard kindly. You feel happy here, I hope ?'

Yes; it is so peaceful. I feel that no one will scold me or beat me. But I wish you were going to stay.'

'Why, my dear child?' asked Joshua, touched by the look of affection that accompanied the words rather than the words themselves. Of what good could I be to you? I could not teach you to sew and to be a clever domestic servant as these kind ladies can.' 'No; but I like you best,' replied Cynthia naïvely.

'I shall come to see you next summer, remember, my dear. It will please me very much if you have learnt to read your Bible by that time.'

Then I'll learn,' replied Cynthia decisively.

'And to be useful and industrious. You must be obedient to your kind mistresses in all things, mind, for I am sure they will never bid you do anything that is not right. And you will attend the chapel twice every Sunday, and on week-day evenings whenever there is a service.'

'Yes; I will do all you tell me.'

'God's blessing and mine be upon you, dear child,' said Joshua solemnly, laying his hand upon the girl's soft hair; and may He receive you among His chosen children and servants! Good-bye." 'Good-bye, sir,' said Cynthia, dropping a low curtsy.

And so they parted; and for many a day and many a month to come the minister carried the memory of that sunlit kitchen, with

its rose-garlanded window, in his mind like a picture; and the lines of the picture grew not less vivid with the progress of time.

CHAPTER VII.·

NAOMI'S HOLIDAY.

MIDSUMMER had come and gone, and it was sultry August weather again, just a year after the loss of the Dolphin; and life in the minister's house went smoothly on in its established course, every day the exact image of its defunct brother, yesterday. Joshua had been a little more watchful of Oswald and Naomi in consequence of that conversation with Nicholas Wild; and, perceiving nothing in the manner of either that passes the bounds of friendly feeling, had refrained so far from any overt interference. When the time came he would be ready to speak and to act; but it seemed to him that the time had not come. He was not going to offer his daughter to any man; and to attempt to interrogate Oswald as to his feelings or his intentions would be in a manner to make such an offer. He had a hearty liking for Oswald Pentreath, and he had confidence in the young man's honour and principle. The life of a man who lives in such a place as Combhollow is tolerably open to inspection, and no one had ever been able to charge Oswald with evil-doing. His pride, his supposed meanness, had been commented upon sharply enough by those who knew him least, and whose ideal squire was a rollicking young man with plenty of money to spend, and a leaning to getting tipsy in the company of his inferiors. But those who liked him least had no more to say than that he was close-fisted and proud; and the few who knew him well praised him warmly, and looked forward to the day when he should rule in his father's place.

Joshua Haggard, after duly considering these things, held his

peace.

'I will bide my time, Judith,' he said, when his sister attacked him on the subject. I have seen no love-making between my daughter and Mr. Pentreath.'

'As if they'd let you see it!' exclaimed Judith. There's plenty of time for sweethearting behind your back. In the Wilderness of an evening, when he brings her plants with crackjaw names—such rubbish! not a flower among 'em equal to a marigold or a nasturtium-and ferns (ferns was nobody's money when I was a girl)do you suppose that isn't sweethearting? And she seldom goes for an afternoon walk but what she meets him.'

'Combhollow isn't a large place,' said Joshua.

'Of course not; and it's easy for young people to make their plans and not miss each other.'

'Jim is always with his sister.'

'Yes, and with his eyes on every bird and bush, and he running off to climb trees half his time. I know that by the state of his clothes.'

I can trust my daughter,' replied Joshua, with a dignity that silenced his sister. 'Naomi will keep no secret from her father.'

One evening early in this golden harvest month the minister took his daughter aside, and questioned her about Oswald Pentreath. 'We have made a new friend within the last year, Naomi,' he began a friend of whom you see rather more than I do. What do you think of him?'

The dark-fringed lids drooped over the thoughtful eyes, and a deep crimson glowed on the oval cheek.

You mean Mr. Pentreath, father?'

'Whom else should I mean, my dear? We don't make many new friends. Tell me frankly how you like him.'

'Very much, father.'

That's a straight answer, at any rate.

Has he ever pro

fessed anything more than friendship for you-such friendship as any well-bred man may naturally feel for a superior young woman?' 'Never!'

And you think him good and true, Naomi ?'

Indeed I do. I should be very sorry if any one thought other

wise of him.'

Why, my love? He is so little to us, that, except for charity's sake, it could matter little what people think of him.'

'I should be sorry if any one thought ill of him, because I know that he deserves people's good word. I know how good he is. I know how patient he is with his father,-how glad he would be to make things better for the tenants; how dearly he loves his absent brother; how kind he is to all dumb things, and to Jim-and me.'

'He has my good opinion, Naomi, and I am glad to hear you speak well of him. But if ever he should seek to be more than your friend-if ever he were to change from friend to lover-you would tell me, wouldn't you, my dear?'

'Yes, father. I would not think of keeping a secret from you. You are always first in my thoughts.'

There are some, doubtless, who would say I do wrong in allowing any friendship between you and Mr. Pentreath, on account of the disparity in your station. But to my mind, a young woman of high principles and good education is not the less a lady because her father happens to keep a shop; and although I cannot boast such a good old name as Pentreath, I think, by setting my good character against the Squire's bad repute, we may fairly balance the

account.'

After this understanding with his daughter, Mr. Haggard felt

quite easy in his mind about Oswald Pentreath. He knew that Naomi had the higher and nobler nature; that union with her would be moral elevation for Oswald; and he thought it a small thing that the conventionalities should be outraged a little by the marriage of the Squire's son with a grocer's daughter. Again, he had enjoyed so much respect and even reverence from his fellow-men in Combhollow, that he may naturally have fancied himself as great a man as the Squire. He knew that he was better liked and trusted, and that in any conflict between the two powers he could command a majority.

He had told his sister and his children that adventure of his on the way to Penmoyle. Naomi had listened with interest, warmly approving her father's conduct to the waif. Judith had taken a chilling view of the whole thing, and had opined that Joshua would live to repent his benevolence.

'I never knew any lasting good to come of mixing oneself up in other people's lives,' she said with conviction. You set 'em going right for a little while, perhaps; but they're pretty sure to go wrong again as soon as your back's turned. It's all very well to teach 'em-of course that's our duty; and no harm ever came of teaching, if it doesn't always do good. But when a minister goes beyond his sphere, and tampers with the bodily wants of any idle vagabond may meet on his way, he's pretty sure to do mischief—at least that's my opinion.'

he

'Fortunately for the poor, it is not an opinion based upon the gospel,' replied Joshua.

'You don't find St. Paul going about the world getting situations for young women, and hampering himself with the expense of their clothing,' retorted Judith. He preached to them. That was his mission, and he stuck to it.'

Joshua took no trouble to defend his line of conduct in this matter. He was so far lord of himself and of his own life as to do what he pleased on all occasions, without any explanation of his motives. But when he came to pack a parcel of materials for Cynthia's clothing, Miss Haggard, who had the drapery business under her thumb, made herself as disagreeable as she could by picking out the ugliest printed goods, the coarsest calico, and flannel very little superior to that which she dealt out to Sally for the washing of stone floors.

you must clothe paupers, clothe them suitably,' she remarked, as she bounced a piece of hideous print upon the counter, the pattern an ace of clubs on a dingy yellow ground.

'I won't have yellow,' said Joshua decisively, recalling that brown-and-yellow striped gown in which the Miss Weblings had arrayed his protégée.

Nothing better to wear and wash,' replied Judith; THIRD SERIES, VOL. VIII. F.S. VOL. XXVIII.

and she'll

G G

want stuff that'll stand wear. Servant-girls can't afford to choose things for prettiness. I sold a gown off that piece to the housemaid at the Grange.'

'I'll choose for myself,' said Joshua, inspecting the shelves. He selected two inoffensive patterns in a cool clean-looking lavender.

That's one of the dearest pieces of goods we've got in stock,' objected Judith.

'I want something that will stand wear,' replied Joshua. Measure a gown off each of those while I look out something for Sundays.'

'She can wear this on Sunday, and plenty good enough, while it's clean.'

Joshua continued his examination of the shelves without noticing this remark, and presently pulled out a piece of printed stuffquite a lady's pattern-white ground dotted with tiny pink rosebuds, fresh and innocent-looking.

'You're not going to cut that piece, surely, Joshua!' cried his sister, horrified. 'I've been saving that for Miss Tremaine. She wanted something neat and pretty for frocks for her nieces.'

'There'll be plenty left for Miss Tremaine's nieces after I've taken off a frock for Cynthia,' replied Mr. Haggard; and without another word to his sister he measured off the regulation quantity, and then changed the hop-sack calico and the coarse flannel for materials of fair and decent quality. Then he looked into the drawers under the counter, and chose a bonnet ribbon, and packed all these things securely in stout brown paper, for the Truro coach.

'I can't think what's come to you, Joshua, meddling with such fiddle-faddle,' said Judith discontentedly.

'I should have left it for you to do, Judith, if you had been disposed to do it with good grace,' answered Joshua calmly.

He wrote the address upon the parcel, and carried it to the Truro coach in his own hands, and gave it into the guard's keeping, with special instructions for its conveyance to Penmoyle. He experienced a mild thrill of happiness after doing this, such as a loving mother feels when she has sent some gift to a child at school.

Shortly after that confidential talk between Naomi and her father, Joshua Haggard gave his children a summer-day's outing, such as they had been accustomed to enjoy once or twice in every summer from their earliest childhood. It was a simple and inexpensive treat enough, consisting of a drive in the general-dealer's tax-cart to some distant town or village whither his duties, spiritual or temporal, or both combined, summoned the minister and shopkeeper. This August the holiday was to be a drive to Rockmouth, where there were one or two small shopkeepers who took their supplies from Joshua, and several families who derived their spiritual sustenance