lady of rather diminutive stature made her appear ance. "My dear Basil!" said the graceful brunette; and she received a fraternal embrace with great meekness and submission-"how long have you been here? Do you know papa is at Whitcombe? Did you see anything of mamma on the road? Is this Mrs. Basil Hope? Are you tired? Did you take luncheon at the Redcross-station ?" "My dear Olivia," replied Basil, "you have certainly become the patron of a querist's society since you and I parted; but before I give myself to the diffusion of useful knowledge, allow me to introduce my wife. Lilian, my love, this is Olivia, my third sister. Olivia, allow me to introduce to you your new sister, Lilian Hope." Olivia extended her small slender fingers, and curtsied with a better grace than the old woman at the lodge; but Lilian fancied with less amicable intentions. "I wish," said Basil, "you would take my wife to her own room; the day has been so dusty and hot, I am sure she is anxious to attend to her toilet." Olivia hesitated whether she should go herself, or depute Mrs. Harrop to do the honours of Lilian's dressing-room, but a glance from her brother decided her; and besides, she thought it would be very entertaining to have the bride all to herself, and to find out what she was like before the rest of the family could have an opportunity. So she led the way up the broad staircase, and through galleries and passages till Lilian began to fear she should never find her way back again. The room into which she was ushered would have contained every chamber in the house at KirbyBrough. Lilian felt like an atom, and a very uncomfortable atom, too. "There will be just time to dress before dinner," said Olivia. "I hear the carriage; mamma is come back, and the dressing-bell will ring in two minutes. Shall I send some one to assist you ?" "Yes, please," said Lilian, almost piteously, for she felt nearly desperate. She did not dare to help herself she would thankfully have unpacked the requisite articles, and attended to her own toilet, but she thought it would not do. Basil had desired her never to do anything that his sisters did not do; and she was pretty sure Miss Olivia would as soon have thought of making a trunk, as of unpacking it. What if she were too late? what if she could not manage her hair? Olivia hastened away when the dressing-bell rang; it was later than she thought, and she was obliged to forego her intention of investigating the state of Lilian's mind and morals for the present. Basil had a short confabulation with his mother, who seemed more dignified than ever. He was proceeding to his own room by a back way, which he had accustomed himself to take when a boy; just as he reached the door which led to his mother's apartment, he heard congregated voices. He stopped, for his own name struck his ear, and then he heard Olivia say--“ A regular school-girl, stupid and shy, but very pretty, certainly; still a mere country beauty, quite uninformed, and, I should think, not at all educated!". Basil bit his lips, and went his way to Lilian's dressing-room, in a state of feud with his clever sister Olivia. CHAPTER IV. GATHERING CLOUDS. "Then we dipt in all That treats of whatsoever is; the state, The total chronicles of man, the mind, And whatsoever can be taught and known." TENNYSON. THE long formal dinner came at last to a conclusion, the dessert was duly dismissed, and Mrs. Hope gave the ladies signal, by telegraphing to her eldest daughter, and rising with elaborate dignity from the head of the table. Basil and his father were left over the wine. Lilian cast a mournful glance on her husband, as she prepared to follow her mother-in-law to the drawingroom; she remembered waiting many years ago for the dentist; she recalled the eve of a long-past schoolexamination, when she and the cleverest girl in the establishment were contesting the prize, and her sensations on those momentous occasions were certainly very similar to those which she now experienced. She scarcely knew what she dreaded; but a vague apprehension of something disagreeable frightened and oppressed her, as she crossed the stately hall, and entered the beautiful room, where she was at some future day to reign sole and undisputed mistress. Basil had said little respecting his sisters, but his wife had gathered that Mary was wonderfully domestic and an excellent manager, her supererogatory services rendering the office of housekeeper almost a sinecure; that Theresa was eminently religious, much devoted to schools and inspections of cottages; that Olivia was alarmingly scientific; and that Harriet was the belle and beauty of the family. They were all talented and accomplished, quite above the general run of young ladies, and the Misses Hope of Hopelands were renowned through the county for their high-breeding, their remarkable attainments, and their fascinations in general. Lilian found herself in a pitfall at the very outset. A large circular glassdish stood on one of the tables, and it was filled with wild flowers, most beautifully arranged. "What lovely flowers!" she exclaimed, as she took her seat at the window, where they were placed. Harriet was pleased at this spontaneous tribute to her taste and judgment, for it was she who had gathered and arranged them; she drew her chair to Lilian's, and began to extol the beauty of the neighbourhood's floral productions, and, somehow, Lilian found herself talking quite comfortably to Harriet; while Mrs. Hope sat cozily on the sofa; Theresa made up the shoe-club accounts; and Mary and Olivia got into a tremendous discussion about the "old red sandstone." It would have been well for Lilian, had the geological dispute lasted till tea-time; as it was, the subject was quickly dismissed, and Olivia came to the pleasant recess, where Harriet and Lilian were still admiring and examining the lovely roses, and other wild flowers of the dell. "You are a lover of flowers, I perceive, Mrs. Basil," said Olivia, mercilessly depetalizing a fine cluster of speedwell as she spoke. "Indeed I am," replied Lilian warmly; "my sisters and I have always been so fond of collecting wild flowers; we have many beautiful kinds in our neighbourhood!" "You have the trollius," said Olivia affirmatively. "I believe it is found only in the northern counties and in Wales. I have never yet been fortunate enough to secure a perfectly healthy specimen for my hortus siccus." "The trollius," said Lilian, musingly, "I do not think I know it." "The Trollius Europeus," continued Olivia, commonly called the Mountain Globe Flower, very scarce; flowers in elevated woody places, rather affects a moist soil, and the remote vicinity of water; petals a beautiful glossy yellow, folded inwards; class and order, according to Withering, Polyandria, Polygynia: under the natural system, Thalamiflora division; family, Ranunculacea. The aquilegia, the delphinium, the anemone, and others, you know, are in the same family!" Poor Lilian! she felt fairly suffocated in science. If Miss Hope had spoken of the columbine and the larkspur, instead of the aquilegia and the delphinium, there would have been something for her to lay hold of; but keeping, as she did, strictly to botanical names, the anemone was the only friendly sound in the whole sentence. She did know and love the pretty fragile wood anemones, and the very name brought back tender reminiscences of the bowery lane leading to Alice Rayner's cottage. "Do you patronize the Linnæan or the natural system, Mrs. Basil?" asked Olivia, in the careless tone of one who pre-supposes every rational man and woman to adhere to one or the other botanical system of classification. Lilian coloured a little, and then answered quietly, "I am sorry to say I know nothing of either. I am ignorant even of the rudiments of botany." "Is it possible ?" interposed Mrs. Hope, waking |