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Thus preaching to Alfred, when he confided to her the fluctuations

of rapture and despair that were his lot in his intercourse with the

so sprite, whose

wings he would fain bind with his e

herself, when perplexed by a flash of Rosa's native perverseness,

Mrs Sutton was sanguine that all would coht in the end What

was to be would be, and despite the rapids in their wooing, Alfred

would find in Rosa a faithful, affectionate little wife, while she

could never hope to secure a better, ible, partner than the Ayletts' well-to-do,

well-looking neighbor

But the couple who occupied the central foreground of our

hts were her niece, Mabel Aylott, and her own

departed husband's namesake, Frederic Chilton She dilated to

herself and to Mabel with especial gusto upon the "wonderful

leading," the inhisper that had pros early in July Neither she nor Mabel

was ailing in the slightest degree, but she ilimpse of the mountains and the livelier scenes

of that pleasant Spa--and whom should they meet there but the son of

"dear Frederic's" old friend, Mr Chilton, and of course they saw a

great deal of him--and the rest followed as Providence meant it

should

"The rest" expressed laconically the essence of nuht; innureat ball-roo confabulations that

people better acquainted in four weeks than would six years of