LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IV, Issue 369, 18 August 1875, Page 4

LITERATURE.

THE ATHELSTON'S OF MORTE d' ATHELSTON. (From the Dublin University Magazine.) Continued. Lord Athelston most politely begged of him not to think of such a thing, he would find plenty to amuse him about the rectory grounds; and so Mr Charnleigh proceeded on his way, and Lord Athelston returned to the house, entering by the glass door of Mr Charnleigh's study, to avoid alarming the females, and startling Miss Sybil into instant retirement. Lord Athelston was really taken by surprise, when, in the dark of the room, he perceived a graceful heap of black silk curled up on she sofa, and Sybil herself, who was startled by the opening window, for once completely lost her presence of mind. As she saw Lord Athelston standing before her, she rose quickly, and muttered something incoherent, as she made towards the door, but Lord (ithelston was too quick for her : ' Sybil,' he said, as he intercepted her passage, ' why do you avoid me, have I done anything to offend you ?' 'No, Lord Athelston,' she whispered, blushing deeply, ' but—but—— ' Lord Athelston,' he repeated after her ; 'Sybil, at Morte d'Athelston, we were cousins, what has made the change ?' The girl looked up quickly ; too well her heart could tell what had made the change, but she could not tell him so, she must make him believe anything but the truth. ' Why, of course there is a great change, now, then you were only an ex-cavalry officer; besides it is different.' 'Why?' ' Well, the weather, perhaps; one is frozen into etiquette here in the Black North, there it was all lovely—not lazy days —one could not be stiff if they tried.' ' Then I wish it was always not lazy days, Sybil; I don't want you to be stiff with me.' And he took the girl's soft white hand in his. What could poor Sybil do ? Her heart went out to this cousin, still he only spoke as a cousin; her (case was becoming des perate ; she tried to draw her hand away, and made a move towards the door; but Lord Athelston was not to be baffled now. He had known for sometime that this girl was very dear to him, but he did not know how much he was to her, though he hoped some day to win her love ; but now that he was beginning to guess the truth, he was determined to have a little mild revenge for the dance she had led him, and more especially for that first interview, wherein she had borne herself so well, while she had made him feel so small, so, as a cat plays with a mouse, only not to end so tragically, he held her tight and smiled, well pleased at her evident embarrassment. 'Let me go,' she said, looking up plaintively into his face, ' I hear the children coming in." ' What do you want with the children ?' he said. ' You are no fit instructress of youth, when you cannot teach them how to treat a guest with good manners.' 'I did not mean to be rude,' she said demurely. ' Not mean to be rude ! when you want to go off to-morrow and leave me here to the tender mercies of Miss Braddon, when I came all the way from London to see you. Sybil, darling, say you won't go.' And the small white hand was dropped, only, however, to enable the gentlemen to clasp her small waist instead. * Say you won't leave me now or ever.' Poor dear Lady Eleanor, teaching her maids upstairs, scrupulously sat out to the very last second of the allotted sixty minutes, which it had ever been her custom to dedicate on Sunday to their instruction ; but it is greatly to be feared that her mind wandered many a time from the overwhelming catastrophes of Job's career, and that she herself was a more practical example of the patience for which that patriarch was so celebrated, than her unappreciating Abigails gave her credit for. But the longest hour has an end in this life, and the class was over at last, and at once the anxious mother set out in quest of her stricken deer ; down the passage her ponderous footsteps (gently, be it spoken) sounded heavily : but so far from yielding to the conventional notions on the subject current in society, which would have made Lord Athelston jump to one side of the room, and Sybil to the other, both looking hopelessly guilty and idiotic, that gentleman only tightened his grasp round the girl, and, as her mother entered the room, imprinted a most unmistakable kiss on her blushing face. Lady Eleanor stood appalled ; it was twenty-five years since she, a maiden fair, had been wooed by the handsome Oxford divine, not to speak of several minor flirtations indulged in with cousins and others, so that this estimable matron must be forgiven if, forgetting some of the accompanying ceremonies, she gazed with undisguised horror on the scene before her. Lord Athelston, noway taken aback, explained matters after his own fashion. ' Lady Eleanor,' he said, 'Sybil has treated me abominably ever since I came, but, as you see, we have been making friends, as she has promised to be a good girl, and not leave me to-morrow; and some day, as soon as she can get over her prejudices, to be my wife.' It is fair to state, on Sybil's behalf, that since Lord Athelston first made his declaration, she had never articulated a sentence; but now, as he relaxed his hold, she did not wait to contradict his statement, but darted by her mother out of the room and upstairs to the privacy of her own chamber ; while he, no doubt, firmly believing that he was strictly adhering to the truth, or, perhaps, taking her silence to be as comprehensive as ' Lord Burleigh's nod,' satisfactorily explained to Lady Eleanor that everything had been arranged between them. The loving mother, with a load of doubt and anxiety suddenly raised from her heart, could only subside on a chair, where she had recourse to the aforementioned very small portion of cambric and tears. But Lady Eleanor did not long give vent to her emotion. 'Lord Athelston,' she said, recovering herself with quiet dignity, 'of course her father and I, much as we love Sybil, and worthy as we know her to be of any fate, cannot but feel that she is making what the world will - call a wonderfully good match, while it will also say that you are not as prudent as are most of the young men of the present day ; but,' she continued, anxiously fixing her eyes upon the young man before her, ' I will not insult you by supposing that you have not thought of all this, and that you are not quite prepared to be true to my whatever opinions your friends may express on the subject.' (To be continued,)