day. Austin knows that I cannot receive to-morrow. I have to meet my man of business to-morrow, and that always agitates me so that I am fit for nothing the next day. If any of you are going to be kind, you may call on Tuesday and ask how I am, but I cannot receive you. I have passed a very happy month. If we four young people should never pass such another together, let us always look back on this one. Good night."

The next month was not such a pleasant one by any means. Politics were becoming embroiled. Mr. Disraeli was saying the most terrible things, and Sir Robert's temper was not always equal to bearing them. Every one was getting hot and angry, and saying things they did not mean. And Austin, having less to do with the matter than most others, was rather hotter and angrier than anybody else. They saw but little of Eleanor, and she for her part wished that the Corn bill was done with for ever, either one way or another.

CHAPTER II.

So little did Austin think about the matter which had troubled him before, that the day of Eleanor's monthly pilgrimage would have passed by altogether without his having noticed it, had it not been for a mere accident, the history of which is this.

Austin had a very good habit of riding out early in the morning before the streets were full, and the smoke had settled down; and on the 15th of April he woke early, and said that he would ride out.

He rang the bell, and when his servant came he ordered his horse to be saddled while he dressed, and called "Robin."

The servant called "Robin too, but Robin was not in his usual place at the foot of the bed, and on further search it became evident that Robin was not in the house, nor in the street either.

"I brought him in last night," said Austin. "Run round to Miss Hilton's, and see if he is there.”

By the time Austin had done dressing, and was standing on the doorstep, in a pair of yellow riding trousers, and a blue neckcloth, his man came back. The dog was not there. It became evident that the dog was stolen.

Austin was vexed and irresolute. At last a foolish scullion-wench, in the lower regions, incautiously volunteered information. Austin's servants immediately claimed that she should be haled before him, and interrogated.

She came upstairs in pattens, with a mop in her hand, her hair all tumbled and tangled, in a dreadful fright. Austin's valet offered to hold her mop for her: she refused. He tried to take it from her; she fought him and beat him, and was ushered into Austin's presence, red, triumphant, with her mop in her hand.

Her mysterious communication about the dog amounted to very little indeed. She had found the dog scratching at the door, and had let him out for a run, "Which the Milk had seen her."

"Find the policeman, and tell him,” said Austin; "as I come home I will ride round by James's."

Riding about the west end of London before nine o'clock on an April morning is a very pleasant pastime. The streets are nearly empty, and you can dawdle as much as you like, while in Piccadilly and such places; the air-should the wind have anything of west in it-is as fresh as it is in the country. Everybody's horses are out exercising, too: and you can see their legs, eyes, tails, and noses showing out of their clothes, and may, if you like, drive yourself mad, by calculating, on the "ex pede Herculem" plan-by an effort of comparative anatomy far beyond Owen-what sort of horses they are, and how much they are worth apiece. You can also see the British cabman free from the cares of office, and many other strange sights, not to be met with later in the day.

It was a very pleasant ride that Austin had on this spring morning. He rode slowly over the piece of wood pavement between Sackville Street and Bond Street, and then trotted till he came to the small patch opposite Devonshire House (both these are laid down in good granite now), where there was a horse down as usual. Then he walked slowly down the hill, and, turning into the newly-opened park, had a gallop along Rotten Row, and, passing out by Kensington Gate, began to feel his way slowly eastward once more.

Through fresh squares, where the lilac was already budding, through squares and streets which grew grander and grander, till they culminated in Belgrave Square itself, and then into the lower part of the town which lies south-east of it.

It is astonishing how rapidly the town degenerates to the south-east of Belgrave Square towards Vauxhall Bridge; or, to be more correct, did degenerate, in those days. From great mansions you suddenly find yourself among ten-roomed houses. So you rapidly deteriorate to six rooms, to four, to old bankrupt show vans taken off their wheels, and moved on the waste ground, like old worn-out hulks; and, after them, dust and ashes, and old paperhangings, and piles of lath and plaster, and pots and kettles, and swarms of wild children; to whom this waste of ash-heaps are mountains, and the stagnant fever-pools, lakes - who build here for themselves the fairy castles of childhood, with potsherds and oyster-shells, and who seem to enjoy more shrill wild happiness, than the children of any other class in the community.

Austin paused before he came to this range of dust Alps. At the junction of two low streets, between Vauxhall Bridge and Millbank, there stood