for sympathy and kindness. She compared the simplicity and ease of her rustic home with the feverish excitement of the scene she had left, and though her reason and her good sense told her which to approve, she found that habit had become tyrannical, and likely to maintain a struggle in her mind which would cost her many bitter tears.

The acquaintance which she had accidentally formed in the city beyond her aunt's sober circle, had been rather showy than solid people, who were however possessed of sufficient refinement to add a degree of fascination to their gay tastes and habits; so that the eyes and ears of the inexperienced country girl were at once dazzled and delighted, and she learned to look upon elegance as almost synonymous with dashing, and to find every thing insipid or vulgar which was characterized by plainness and sobriety. No wonder she contemplated with mortified pride the unadorned aspect of things at home! We are all, it is true enough, marvellously forgetful of the outward life after we have lived long enough at the West to become indoctrinated with the current opinions; - but to return.

Unpleasant feelings were not wanting on the other side. So prone is youth to extremes, that it is not surprising that Caroline should have used her liberty and her father's liberal allowance in providing herself with dress which was rather gaudy than elegant. Her aunt had felt her inability to be a counsellor on a subject where her own views were

averse to even the smallest indulgence of taste or fancy, and the dress-maker had been but too happy to display all her art on so elegant a form those artists generally considering their employers rather in the light of sign-posts than of rational beings. So our poor Caroline was very fine. There were such loads of curls that the fair head reminded one of a flourishing bed of Scotch kail, or of the decorations of some lucky child, who, having the petites entrées of a carpenter's shop, makes use of the opportunity to cover her eyes and ears with elegant pine shavings. Her fingers were heaped with incongruous rings, and worse than all were the long ear-pendants, which vibrated with every word, and seemed determined to repose their weary length on the snow-white shoulders below.

A costume, which would appear a little ultra even in the city, wears an air of absolute ridicule in the country; and while Caroline was feeling the plainness of her mother and sisters as a mortification to her pride, they, on their part, were absolutely ashamed of her finery. They could not think her ornaments improved her beauty, and, as a further and incontestable proof of their rustic breeding, they told her so; which made her cry, and then they were sorry, and on the whole there was a degree of constraint in their intercourse which cast a shadow on the delight of having Caroline at home once more.

These things being so, we must acknowledge

that it afforded rather a relief when word came that Mrs. Thurston, overcome by distress and fatigue, added to some exposure in her night-ride, was quite ill at Mr. Ellingham's, and much in need of some friendly aid from Caroline or her mother. Seymour Bullitt brought the message, and Caroline, when she saw him by daylight, was more struck than before with the marvellous improvement in his appearance, and particularly with the quiet selfpossession of his manner. Indeed she could not but own to herself that she had known a person, far his inferior in most respects, pass in the city as "a splendid fellow "- but then, old recollections, and such a countrified name!

Mrs. Hay went to Mrs. Thurston, who grew worse daily; and after a few days' effort, ague accomplished its usual work by prostrating the nurse; and Caroline took her mother's place by the bedside of the sufferer.

This was a new scene for her, and one which soon proved of an absorbing interest. Mrs. Thurston's symptoms became more and more alarming, while she herself won more and more upon the affections of her young attendant. She was of a saintly piety, and so lovely in disposition and manner that it was impossible for a young and ingenuous mind to know her without loving her. No extremity of suffering ever overtasked her patience, no disappointment or omission of duty in others ever ruffled her serene countenance. Hers was that perfect

self-forgetfulness which binds all around to a warm and voluntary attention and remembrance, and Caroline felt that the cares and fatigues of such a sick chamber were any thing but a task. She was sole nurse, for though every effort had been made to procure a regular one, there was no such being within ken, and the neighbors, though all kindness, were distant, and could not leave their homes, or perhaps were detained by the illness of their own families, for it is one of the disadvantages of the country that sickness is very apt to prevail in neighborhoods so as to make it difficult to procure attendance.

During this time of trial and anxiety Seymour was by no means an idle spectator. He had become interested in Mrs. Thurston and her husband from the circumstances of his first meeting with them, and they in turn had appreciated his kind manner, and felt gratified by his friendly attentions. Now that they were in need of real and substantial aid, Seymour was at the service of the sick and afflicted, and many times a day might have been observed galloping in various directions, on different errands of mercy, a most useful auxiliary in the country where population is so scattered, and the ordinary comforts of the invalid sometimes so far to seek. It not unfrequently fell to his lot to be the bearer of messages or more ponderous matters between Mr. Hay's house and the scene of suffering,

and sometimes to escort to and fro the young nurse, when she could be spared for a little while.

It would be difficult to say just what were Seymour's feelings towards his fair enemy at this period. He thought them those belonging to indifference; indeed, he sometimes concluded, of dislike. Her manner, though softened much by the late rousing of her sensibilities, was still that of one who had been accustomed to admiration; and though she had gradually, and almost unconsciously, laid by all her finery, her appearance retained something of that dashing air which struck Seymour unpleasantly, both from his natural taste for grave simplicity and from its unsuitableness to the objects by which they were surrounded. And Miss Hay, if she thought of Seymour at all, had all old impressions habitually present, although she was often surprised to notice traits which she could not reconcile to those impressions. But she was not much concerned to do justice to one whom she had known as a clodhopper; so their intercourse, though civil and frequent, was frigid enough.

They were one evening at sunset returning together to Mr. Ellingham's, and had turned from the high road into the wood, when they were overtaken by a horseman, whose rapid pace continued till he had passed them, when he reined up suddenly, and greeted Miss Hay as an old acquaintance. He was a young man of gentlemanly