really must go and see what has become of her all this time," she continued, rising to leave the apartment.

"I thought there was nothing my mother disliked so much as being hunted about," rejoined I; "I wonder you can think of disturbing her."

A playful shake of the head was her only reply, and she quitted the room.

CHAPTER XLI.

HOW LAWLESS BECAME A LADY'S MAN.

"Doublet and hose should show itself courageous to petticoats. Therefore, courage!"

-As You Like It.

"From the crown of his head, to the sole of his foot, he is all mirth. He hath a heart as sound as a bell, and his tongue is the clapper; for what his heart thinks, his tongue speaks."

"FRANK, I am not at all satisfied about your sister,” began Oaklands, as the door closed after her. "She does not look well, and she seems entirely to have lost her spirits."

"I thought as you do, before I went up for my degree,” replied I; "but since my return, I hoped she was all right again. What makes you imagine her out of spirits ?"

"Oh! several things; she never talks and laughs as she used to do. Why, all this afternoon I could scarcely get half a dozen words out of her; and she seems to have no energy to do anything. How unwilling she appeared to enter into my scheme about the riding! She evidently dislikes the idea of excrtion of any kind: I know the feeling well; but it is not natural for her; she used to be surprisingly active, and was the life and soul of the party. But what, perhaps, has caused me to notice all this so particularly, and makes me exceedingly uncomfortable, is, that I am afraid it is all owing to me."

"Owing to you, my dear Harry! what can you mean?" inquired I.

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Why, I fear that business of the duel, and the great care she and your mother took of me, (for which,-believing, as I do, that under Providence it saved my life,-I can never be sufficiently. grateful,) have been too much for her. Remember, she was quite a girl; and no doubt seeing an old friend brought to the house apparently dying must have been a very severe shock to her, and,

depend upon it, her nerves have never recovered their proper tone. However, I shall make it my business to endeavour to interest and amuse her, and you must do everything you can to assist me, Frank; we'll get all the new books down from London, and have some people to stay at the Hall. She has shut herself up too much; Ellis says she has; I shall make her ride on horseback every day."

"Horseback, eh!" exclaimed Lawless, who had entered the cottage without our perceiving him. "Ay, that's a prescription better than all your doctor's stuff; clap her on a side-saddle, and a brisk canter for a couple of hours every day across country will set the old lady up again in no time, if it's your mother that's out of condition, Frank. Why, Oaklands, man, you are looking as fresh as paint; getting sound again, wind and limb, eh ?"

"I hope so, at last,” replied Harry, shaking Lawless warmly by the hand; but I've had a narrow escape of losing my life, I can

assure you."

"No; really, I didn't know it had been as bad as that! By Jove, if he had killed you, I'd have shot that black-hearted villain, Wilford, myself, and chanced about his putting a bullet into me while I was doing it."

"My dear Lawless, I thank you for your kind feeling towards me; but I cannot bear to hear you speak in that light way of duelling," returned Oaklands, gravely; "if men did but know the misery they were entailing on all those who cared for them by their rash acts, independently of all higher considerations; duelling, and its twin brother, suicide, would be less frequent than they When I have seen the tears stealing down my father's griefworn cheeks, and witnessed the anxious, painful expression in the faces of the kind friends who were nursing me, and have reflected that it was by yielding to my own ungoverned passions that I had brought all this sorrow upon them, my remorse has often been far harder to bear, than any pain my wound has caused me."

are.

At this moment, my mother and Fanny making their appearance, I hastened to introduce Lawless, who, being greatly alarmed at the ceremony, grew very red in the face, shuffled my mother into a corner of the room, and upset a chair against her, stumbling over Harry's legs, and knocking down the chess-board in the excess of his penitence. Having with my assistance remedied these disasters, after stigmatizing himself as an awkward dog, and comparing himself to a bull in a china-shop, he turned to Fanny, exclaiming

"Delighted to have the pleasure of seeing you at last, Miss Fairlegh; it is several years since I first heard of you. Do you remember the writing-desk at old Mildman's, eh, Frank? no end of a shame of me to spoil it; I have often thought so since; but boys will be boys, eh, Mrs. Fairlegh?"

My mother acquiesced in this obstinate adherence to their primary formation on the part of the junior members of the nobler sex, with so much cordiality, that Lawless was encouraged to proceed.

"Glad to find there's a chance of seeing you out with us some of these days, ma'am; shall we be able to persuade you to accompany us to-morrow?"

"Yes, I think it very likely that I may go," returned my mother, who imagined he was referring to some proposed drive; "in what direction will it be, pray ?"

"Direction, eh? Why that of course depends very much on what line he may happen to take when he breaks cover," returned Lawless. My mother, who had been previously advised of Lawless's sporting metaphors, concluding that the "he" referred to Sir John Oaklands, calmly replied,

"Yes, certainly, I was mentioning the ruins of Saworth Abbey to Sir John yesterday; do you know them?"

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"I should think I did,—rather," exclaimed Lawless, forgetting his company manners in the interest of the subject. Why, I have seen more foxes run into in the fields round Saworth than in any other parish in the country. Whenever the meet is either at Grinder's End, or Chorley Bottom, the fox is safe to head for Saworth. Oh! I see you're up to the whole thing, Mrs. Fairlegh; we shall have you showing all of us the way across country in fine style to-morrow. I expect there'll be some pretty stiff fencing though, if he should take the line you imagine, but I suppose you don't mind anything of that sort; with a steady, well-trained hunter, (and a lady should never ride one that is not,) there's very little danger-take care to keep out of the crowd when you're getting away; don't check your horse at his fences; have a little mercy on his bellows over the heavy ground; and with a light weight like yours, you might lead the field. Why, Frank, you ought to be proud of Mrs. Fairlegh. I tell you what,—the first time the hounds meet near Leatherly, I'll have my mother out, whether she likes it or not. I'll stand no nonsense about it, you may depend; she shall see a run for once in her life, at all events. Mrs. Fairlegh, ma'am,"

he continued, rising, and shaking her warmly by the hand, "excuse my saying so, but you're a regular brick,-you are indeed!"

The scene at this moment would not have made a bad study for a painter. Oaklands, having struggled in vain to preserve his gravity, was in fits of laughter. Fanny, who had from the first perceived the equivoque, was very little better, while my mother, completely mystified, sat staring at Lawless, whom she evidently considered a little insane, with an expression of bewildered astonishment, not unmixed with fear. As soon as I could contrive to speak, (for Lawless's face, when he had discovered the effect he had produced, completely finished me, and I laughed till the tears ran down my cheeks,) I explained to him that it was my sister, and not my mother, who was thinking of riding, while the notion of hunting originated wholly and solely in his own fertile imagination.

"Eh? What! she doesn't hunt ?-ah! I see, put my foot in it pretty deep this time; beg pardon, Mrs. Fairlegh-no offence meant, I assure you. Well, I thought it was a very fast thing for an old—I,—that is, for a lady to do. I fancied you were so well up in the whole affair, too: most absurd, really; I certainly am not fit for female society. I think, when the hunting season's over, I shall put myself to one of those tip-top boarding schools, to learn manners for a quarter; the sort of shop, you know, where they teach woman her mission,-(how to get a rich husband, eh, Frank?) for £300 a year, washing and church principles extra, and keep a 'Professor' to instruct the young ladies in the art of getting out of a carriage on scientific principles, that is, without showing their ankles. Didn't succeed very well with my sister Julia, though; the girl happens to be particularly clean about the pasterns, so she declared it was infringing on the privileges of a free-born British subject, vowed her ankles were her own property, and she had a right to do what she liked with 'em, and carried out her principles by kicking the Professor's shins for him. Plucky girl is Julia; she puts me very much in mind of what I was when I was her age at Eton, and pinned a detonating cracker to old Botherboy's coat-tail, so that, what between the pin and the explosion, it's my belief he would have found himself more comfortable in the battle of Waterloo, than he felt the first time he sat down. those were happy days!"

Ah!

Thus running on, Lawless kept us in a roar of laughter, till Oaklands, pulling out his watch, discovered it was time to return to the Hall, and prepare for dinner. It turned out on examination, that