"I generally go to my aunt about this time of the year."

"It is very good-natured of you." Then he asked after her father, and she told him of Mr. Belton's visit, telling him nothing—as the reader will hardly require to be told—of Mr. Belton's offer. And so, by degrees, they fell into close and intimate conversation.

"I am so glad, for your father's sake!" said the captain, with sympathetic voice, speaking still of Mr. Belton's visit.

"That's what I feel, of course."

"It is just as it should be, as he stands in that position to the property. And so he is a nice sort of fellow, is he?"

"Nice is no word for him. He is perfect!"

"Dear me! This is terrible! You remember that they hated some old Greek patriot when they could find no fault in him?"

"I'll defy you to hate my cousin Will."

"What sort of looking man is he?"

"Extremely handsome;—at least I should say so."

"Then I certainly must hate him. And clever?"

"Well;—not what you would call clever. He is very clever about fields and cattle."

"Come, there is some relief in that."

"But you must not mistake me. He is clever; and then there's a way about him of doing everything just as he likes it, which is wonderful. You feel quite sure that he'll become master of everything."

"But I do not feel at all sure that I should like him the better for that!"

"But he doesn't meddle in things that he doesn't understand. And then he is so generous! His spending all that money down there is only done because he thinks it will make the place pleasanter to papa."