whom she accidentally met one day within the Rules of the Queen's Bench, looking what he himself called very "seedy," and quite out at elbows. He wished to pass Lucy by unnoticed, but, associating. him with Henry Greville, Lucy would speak to him; and she heard, to her great surprise, that not only had Cecil heard twice from him, but that he had expressed intense anxiety and alarm at not hearing from " a very dear friend." Cecil looked so meaningly, and spoke these words with so much emphasis, that Lucy felt sure he meant herself; and at her request he gave her Henry Greville's address, and in return obtained all the intelligence she thought herself justified in giving him of that "regular brick," as he called her, "Mrs. Green Brown," adding (for Lucy did not say a word about her having a husband), "that if he did but know where she was, he'd make up to her directly, and if she'd have him, get him out of quod, and give him a new rig-out, he'd make her a kind hus

band: though she was some ten or fifteen years his senior, he did not care a hang for that; she had the tin, and was the besttempered, best-hearted old gal in the world, and a deuced fine woman into the bargain !”

When poor Lucy got home she sat down to her desk, and poured out her heart to her beloved. She told him frankly all about the troth-ring she had given him at parting, having been seen by her exposed for sale and bought by herself, to be given to him again when he explained, as she knew he could do, how he came to lose it. There was no pique, no doubt, no distrust in Lucy's love-letter. It was all frankness, confidence, tenderness; and having posted it herself, and told him where to address any letter for her, she sat down to her work with a lighter heart and a sanguine hope of receiving, in due time, a satisfactory reply from her affianced.

It was while she was thus occupied, that her mother, being out for a short walk, the

maid servant came in with a letter which the postman had just brought. Lucy did not know the hand, but on opening it, she found it was from young Masterman. He said :

"Beautiful and beloved Miss Blair, I have waited till I had completed my twenty-first year before I ventured to address you by letter. On this day of my majority I come into a considerable property left me by an aunt, and I value it only through the hope that you will let me throw it with myself at your feet. Being independent, I have no reason to ask my parents' consent, and yours will make the happiest of men of,

"HORACE MASTERMAN."

Lucy, without a moment's hesitation, replied kindly and gratefully, telling him she was affianced to another; nor did she mention the offer to her mother until accidentally Mrs. Blair, looking for a receipt, found the letter, and asked her whence it came.

VOL. III.

R

CHAPTER XII.

A LABOUR OF LOVE.

ALL "through the winter" things went on quietly. Lucy worked hard at her pen under Grinlay Snarl's direction, and its proceeds, with her mother's quarterly ten pounds, enabled them to live in tolerable comfort-but not more than this; for the magazine that Grinlay Snarl had started (and in which he had put Lucy's Railway Adventure and her tale), after being advertised in every paper, and placarded everywhere in letters of monster size, and all the colours of the rainbow, went

down, down, down, every week (after the first month), and at last disappeared altogether.

It was, therefore, only as a sub-reviewer that Lucy was now employed, and constantly was she at variance with Grinlay Snarl for not using enough "lemon-juice and cayenne" in her dish of criticism. However, unknown to him, and even to her mother, Lucy had begun a novel, in three volumes; and to this labour of love she devoted all the time she could snatch from the ungrateful task of working as Grinlay Snarl's sub.

This novel gave her a new interest, a new hope, a new existence; and she lived in her imaginary world, and among her ideal creations, a brighter and happier life than she did as a literary drudge under an exacting, faultfinding task-master.

And now the dreary winter and dull cold. months of early spring had passed away, and Grinlay Snarl had announced that he meant to have a holiday on the last day of May, for