"You do comfort me," he said, turning affectionately towards her again. "I should indeed be desolate now, if it were not for you, Evelyn!"

"But not now only," she continued, and her manner became more earnest, more excited, as she spoke; "in future-alwayswill you let me always comfort you? Will you let me be to you what Juliet is?"

He looked at her for a moment, then turned away his face, as a strange and painful expression passed over it; then again he looked and spoke with unusual quickness and agitation. "Dear Evelyn, you must not speak to me in this way. I know that you would not give me pain; but you cannot know, you cannot guess, how painful such words are to me from you. What strange, wild thoughts pass through my mind!" He spoke the last words involuntarily, and he would have hurried away.

But Evelyn again laid her hand on his arm, and raised her pure, open, confiding eyes to his face. "What thoughts, Mr. Harcourt? Tell me why I should not speak so, when it

would make me so happy, so very happy, to be to you what Juliet is."

Again he glanced at her, paused, and hesitated; then, fixing his eyes upon her, he said, gravely and steadily: "Because you could not be to me what Juliet is, except as my wife, and you know that you cannot be that. Forgive me for saying such words, Evelyn. I ought not to speak to you in this way.'

"But I can!" she said, earnestly; and still, without fear or embarrassment, her eyes were raised to his. "I will be your wife, your daughter, what you will, only to make you happy."

He made no answer to her words, but stooped and kissed her fair, open brow with a father's affection, and left the room.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

To cling to him as to her guide, her friend—
Hang on his smile, and shrink if he reprove;
Count life's best care, the care his life to tend-
Who shall deny that this was also love?

In spite of Dr. Leicester's predictions, with one of these rapid changes to which the disease which had now fastened upon Juliet is subject, the little girl rallied again the very next day; and so wonderful was the apparent improvement, that, although Evelyn and Mr. Harcourt knew Dr. Leicester's opinion, hope revived in the hearts of both.

On the previous day, having gathered from Evelyn something of the conversation she had had with the physician and her father, Juliet, for the first time, spoke to Mr. Harcourt of herself; and, as with tearful eyes she talked of leaving him, she alluded also to her hope

respecting Evelyn. And Mr. Harcourt fancied that he had discovered the origin of Evelyn's words during their late interview.

The day passed, but he did not renew the conversation; and Evelyn, left to doubt, and hope, and fear, became strangely anxious on the subject, and wondered at herself, and blamed herself, that even now, when she was so unhappy about Juliet, her thoughts should wander on to the future, and picture it smiling and bright to her eyes; but so it was;-to the future, the dreams of the future, they turned again and again.

If it be asked what was the nature of Evelyn's love to Mr. Harcourt, it is not difficult to answer. She could not remember the time when she had not prized his smile, and dreaded his reproof more than any thing in the world; and it was but a step; it required but the knowledge of such a feeling towards her on his part, to change the reverence and affection, which she had always felt, into love. In her nature, love was composed but of two parts-the happiness of leaning on, of clinging to one superior to herself, and of feeling that

she was the object of his unceasing love and care; and, mingled with this, and even greater than this, the happiness of devoting herself to him of cheering, blessing, comfortingof being herself needful to him, who was guiding and blessing her. Even in her early and more imaginative love, its nature had been the same; and, the reaction of feeling herself nothing where she had hoped to be all -of finding herself scorning where she had reverenced, as one far above the rest of the world-this had been powerful in overcoming the blow inflicted on her early budding hopes. This kind of love is not perhaps the highest kind, but it is a very common kind, and has a strength and an endurance, which, in more passionate love, is sometimes wanting.

On the morning of the day following the one of Juliet's partial reviving and recovery, while hope was still whispering in his heart, Mr. Harcourt determined to renew and to close for ever the subject which had been so strangely and suddenly raised between Evelyn and him.

He found her in the drawing-room with