This is a gentle delineation, is it not, reader? Yet he whom it

describes scarcely impressed one with the idea of a gentle, a

yielding, an impressible, or even of a placid nature. Quiescent as

he now sat, there was something about his nostril, his mouth, his

brow, which, to my perceptions, indicated elements within either

restless, or hard, or eager. He did not speak to me one word, nor

even direct to me one glance, till his sisters returned. Diana, as

she passed in and out, in the course of preparing tea, brought me a

little cake, baked on the top of the oven.

"Eat that now," she said: "you must be hungry. Hannah says you

have had nothing but some gruel since breakfast."

I did not refuse it, for my appetite was awakened and keen. Mr.

Rivers now closed his book, approached the table, and, as he took a

seat, fixed his blue pictorial-looking eyes full on me. There was

an unceremonious directness, a searching, decided steadfastness in

his gaze now, which told that intention, and not diffidence, had

hitherto kept it averted from the stranger.

"You are very hungry," he said.

"I am, sir." It is my way--it always was my way, by instinct--ever

to meet the brief with brevity, the direct with plainness.

"It is well for you that a low fever has forced you to abstain for

the last three days: there would have been danger in yielding to

the cravings of your appetite at first. Now you may eat, though

still not immoderately."

"I trust I shall not eat long at your expense, sir," was my very

clumsily-contrived, unpolished answer.

"No," he said coolly: "when you have indicated to us the residence

of your friends, we can write to them, and you may be restored to

home."

"That, I must plainly tell you, is out of my power to do; being

absolutely without home and friends."

The three looked at me, but not distrustfully; I felt there was no

suspicion in their glances: there was more of curiosity. I speak

particularly of the young ladies. St. John's eyes, though clear

enough in a literal sense, in a figurative one were difficult to

fathom. He seemed to use them rather as instruments to search other

people's thoughts, than as agents to reveal his own: the which

combination of keenness and reserve was considerably more calculated

to embarrass than to encourage.

"Do you mean to say," he asked, "that you are completely isolated

from every connection?"




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