Protestants. Indeed no difference was made between Eustace and me when we were at Walwyn. Our grandmother taught us both alike to make the sign of the cross, and likewise to say our prayers and the catechism; and oh! we loved her very much.

Eustace once gave two black eyes to our rude cousin, Harry Merricourt, for laughing when he said no one was as beautiful as the grandmother, and though I am an old woman myself, I think he was right. She was like a little fairy, upright and trim, with dark flashing eyes, that never forgot how to laugh, and snowy curls on her brow.

I believe that the dear old lady made herself ill by nursing us two children day and night when we had the small-pox. She had a stroke, and died before my father could be fetched from London; but I knew nothing of all that; I only grieved, and wondered she did not come to me, till at last the maid who was nursing me told me flatly that the old lady was dead. I think that afterwards we were sent down to a farmer's house by the sea, to be bathed and made rid of the infection; and that the pleasure of being set free from our sick chambers and of playing on the shore drove from our minds for the time our grief for the good granddame, though indeed I dream of her often still, and of the old rooms and gardens at Walwyn, though I have never seen them since.

When we were quite well and tolerably free from pock-marks, my father took us to London with him, and there Eustace was sent to school at Westminster; while I, with little Berry, had a tutor to teach us Latin and French, and my mother's waiting-maid instructed me in sewing and embroidery. As I grew older I had masters in dancing and the spinnet, and my mother herself was most careful of my deportment. Likewise she taught me such practices of our religion as I had not learnt from my grandmother, and then it was I found that I was to be brought up differently from Eustace and the others. I cried at first, and declared I would do like Eustace and my father, but no one would listen to me, not even my father. I did not think much about it; I was too childish and thoughtless to be really devout; and when my mother took me in secret to the queen's little chapel, full of charming objects of devotion, while the others had to sit still during sermons two hours' long, I began to think that I was the best off.

Since that time I have thought much more, and talked the subject over both with my dear eldest brother and with good priests, both English and French, and I have come to the conclusion, as you know, my children, that the English doctrine is no heresy, and that the Church is a true Church and Catholic, though, as my home and my duties lie here, I remain where I was brought up by my mother, in the communion of my husband and children. I know that this would seem almost heresy to our good Père Chavand, but I wish to leave my sentiments on record for you, my children.

But how I have anticipated my history! I must return, to tell you that when I was just sixteen, I was told that I was to go to my

first ball at Whitehall. My hair was curled over my forehead, and I was dressed in white satin, with the famous pearls of Ribaumont round my neck, though of course they were not to be mine eventually.

I knew the palace well, having often had the honour of playing with the Lady Mary, who was some years younger than I, so that I was much less alarmed than many young gentlewomen there making their first appearance. But, as my dear brother Eustace led me into the outer hall, close behind my father and mother, I heard a strange whistle, and, looking up, I saw over the balustrade of the gallery a droll monkey face looking out of a mass of black curls, and making significant grimaces at me.

I knew well enough that it was no other than the Prince of Wales. He was terribly ugly and fond of teasing, but in a good-natured way, always leaving off when he saw he was giving real pain, and I liked him much better than his brother, the Duke of York, who was proud and sullen. Yet one could always trust the Duke, and that could not be said for the Prince.

By the time we had slowly advanced up the grand staircase into the banqueting hall, and had made our reverences to the King and Queen-ah, how stately and beautiful they looked together!—the Prince had stepped in, some other way, and stood beside me.

'Well, Meg,' he said, in an undertone-'I beg pardon, Mistress Margaret-decked out in all her splendour, a virgin for the sacrifice!' 'What sacrifice, sir?' I asked, startled.

'Eh!' he said. You do not know that le futur is arrived!'

'She knows nothing, your highness,' said Eustace.

'What, oh what is there to know?' I implored the Prince and my brother in turn to inform me, for I saw that there was some earnest in the Prince's jests, and I knew that the Queen and my mother were looking out for a good match for me in France.

'Let me show him to you,' presently whispered the Prince, who had been called off by his father to receive the civilities of an ambassador. Then he pointed out a little wizened, dried-up old man, who was hobbling up to kiss her majesty's hand, and whose courtly smile seemed to me to sit most unnaturally on his wrinkled countenance. I nearly screamed. I was forced to bite my lips to keep back my tears, and I wished myself child enough to be able to scream and run away, when my mother presently beckoned me forward. I hardly had strength to curtsey when I was actually presented to the old man. Nothing but terror prevented my sinking on the floor, and I heard as through falling waters something about M. le Marquis de Nidemerle and Mistress Margaret Ribaumont, for so we were called in England.

By and by I found that I was dancing, I scarcely knew how or with whom, and I durst not look up the whole time, nor did my partner address a single word to me, though I knew he was near me; I was only too thankful that he did not try to address me.

To my joy, when we had made our final reverences, he never came near me again all the evening. I found myself among some young maidens who were friends of mine, and in our eager talk together I began to forget what had passed, or to hope it was only some teasing pastime of the Prince and Eustace.

When we were seated in the coach on the way to our house my father began to laugh and marvel which had been the most shy, the gallant or the lady, telling my mother she need never reproach the English with bashfulness again after this French specimen.

'How will he and little Meg ever survive to morrow's meeting!' he said.

Then I saw it was too true, and cried out in despair to beg them to let me stay at home, and not send me from them; but my mother bade me not be a silly wench. I had always known that I was to be married in France, and the Queen and my half-brother, M. de Solivet, had found an excellent parti for me. I was not to embarrass matters by any folly, but I must do her credit, and not make her regret that she had not sent me to a convent to be educated.

Then I clung to my father. I could hold him tight in the dark, and the flambeaux only cast in a fitful, flickering light. 'O sir,' said I, you cannot wish to part with your little Megl' 'You are your mother's child, Meg,' he said sadly. I gave you up to her to dispose of at her will.'

'And you will thank me one of these days for your secure home,' said my mother. If these rogues continue disaffected, who knows what they may leave us in England.'

'At least we should be together,' I cried, and I remember how I fondled my father's hand in the dark, and how he returned it. We should never have thought of such a thing in the light; he would have been ashamed to allow such an impertinence, and I to attempt it.

old

Perhaps it emboldened me to say timidly, 'If he were not so

But my mother declared that she could not believe her ears that a child of hers should venture on making such objections-so unmaidenly, so undutiful to a parti selected by the Queen and approved by her parents.

As the coach stopped at our own door I perceived that certain strange noises that I had heard proceeded from Eustace laughing and chuckling to himself all the way. I must say I thought it very unkind and cruel when we had always loved each other so well. I would hardly bid him good-night, but ran up to the room I shared with nurse and Annora, and wept bitterly through half the night, little comforted by nurse's assurance that old men were wont to let their wives have their way far more easily than young ones did.

(To be continued.)

KEEPING THE VOW.

PART I.

HOW THE VOW WAS MADE.

CHAPTER I.

THE name above the 'low-browed' shop-door was 'David Hepburn,' in letters somewhat tarnished; but brighter gilding would have seemed out of keeping with the quaint, narrow street of Ennerleddie, a town as pleasant for situation as any in all bonnie Scotland. The shop itself, which to our modern ideas would have appeared humble and insignificant enough, was much patronised, not only by the betterclass townspeople, but by county families in the neighbourhood; for its proprietor was respected by all who knew him, and was a man in whose history there was a flavour of romance. He had been 'out' with the Earl of Mar in 'the rising of '15,' and had been slightly wounded at Sheriffmuir. In 'the '45' he had taken no active part, being by that time a 'douce merchant,' with a wife and bairns; but it was shrewdly suspected that his house had been a rendezvous for Jacobites of his own class, and its quaint chambers and recesses the occasional refuge and hiding place of non-juring clergymen and other persons of higher social and political importance. Probably he had helped the cause that he loved best by gifts of money-for, although his business had always seemed large, he had never been counted a wealthy man ; and his mode of life, though not wanting in substantial comfort, was now, and ever had been, simple and homely.

For the last five years he had been a widower; and of his children, only one, the youngest, was still spared to him. This child, a girl nearly eighteen years old, had been absent from home for some weeks, visiting relations who lived in Port Henry, a small fishing-town on the north-eastern coast; she had been accompanied and guarded by an elderly woman who had been her nurse, and in whom Mr. Hepburn placed great confidence.

This evening the travellers were expected home, and the shop was closed earlier than usual-a messenger from the harbour, which was about three miles distant from the town, having run up to tell the master that the little trading vessel, the Bonnie Mary, was entering the roads. David Hepburn saw his two assistants depart, and then himself locked the door; for his dwelling-house was at some little distance from the main street, near the cathedral ruins, and had, in fact, at one time been a part of the monastic buildings.

The evening was one of those in early summer, the beauty of which

appears to greater perfection in the north of Scotland than in any other part of Great Britain. There is often a great calm in the skyblue indeed-but beginning to be touched with the delicate pink flush and undertone of pale gold that, after the sun has really sunk to his seeming rest (rather, thanks be to God, to his ever-renewed awakening), will deepen into the red, rich glory of the after-glow '-a glory inconceivable to those who have not seen it illuminate the hills and moors and woods of a Scottish landscape.

Maister Hepburn could not help lingering and letting the cool, yet quiet, air breathe its refreshing influence upon his face, flushed by the day's confinement in a small, close shop. The feelings of his heart were just then very much in accordance with the calm gladness of the summer evening, and so he walked home to meet a great sorrow; and as he went, dreamed of nothing but coming joy. A little surprise did indeed touch his mind that his girl was not at the door to meet him; this, and the hurrying-out-of-sight motion of the younger maid of the house as he crossed the lobby, conveyed their own notes of warning, and mercifully deadened his sensations, so that the coming. blow did not fall with such crushing force as it would otherwise have done. Going straight into the parlour, which, as in many oldfashioned Scotch houses, opened into the front kitchen, he called out, forcing his voice to cheerful tones

'Clemmie, my lassie, whaur are ye?'

There followed a little time of silence-really a short pause-but long enough to be appreciable by the man who waited; and then an elderly woman, still in out-door apparel, came in from the kitchen slowly; slowly also she closed the door before she turned and faced her master, saying distinctly, and without any perceptible quiver in her

voice

Clementina is no' wi' me, Maister Hepburn; but dinna ye flyte upo' me; it's no' my blame; I hae dune my vera best.' And now, at last, the old woman's voice trembled, whilst one long bony hand tightened convulsively upon the other.

It was a moment of agony for Maister Hepburn; he closed his eyes, and a little shiver passed over him, so that his stalwart frame seemed to totter and sway as he said. hoarsely

'What is't, wuman? What's wrang wi' the bairn? She's no' deidsurely ye'll no' be tellin' me that?'

'Na, na, she's no' deid; she's as weel in her health as me or yersel, Maister Hepburn.'

Another and different look swept over the old man's face; he put out his hand to grasp the woman's.

'It's no' possible that she's fallen in wi' yon man again—wi' her ne'er-do-weel cousin, Ronald McRonald?'

'Aye, maister, just that; it's a fac'; it was bude to be; and I could na' haud her frae him ony gate.'