will talk no more about it. Come, let us overtake Elizabeth; we must not let her go all the way to Clifton in solitary state."

And so ended the very promising trial at match-making, upon which the pretty Mary Peters had wasted so many useless meditations! It was a useful lesson to her, for she has never been known to interfere in any affair of the kind since.

CHAPTER XI.

MRS. BARNABY FEELS CONSCIOUS OF IMPROVEMENT, AND REJOICES AT IT.—HOPES FOR THE FUTURE.—A CONVERSATION IN WHICH MUCH GENEROUS SINCERITY IS DISPLAYED.—A LETTER INTENDED TO BE EXPLANATORY, BUT FAILING TO BE SO.

Mrs. Barnaby's first feelings after the Major left her were agreeable enough. She had escaped with little injury from a great danger, and, while believing herself infinitely wiser than before, she was conscious of no reason that should either lower her estimate of herself, or check the ambitious projects with which she had set forth from her native town to push her fortune in the world. But her views were improved and enlarged, her experience was more practical and enlightened, and her judgment, as to those trifling fallacies by which people of great ability are enabled to delude people of little, though in no degree changed as to its morale, was greatly purified and sharpened as to the means to be employed. Thus, by way of example, it may be mentioned that, during the hour of mental examination which followed Major Allen's adieux, Mrs. Barnaby determined never again to mention Silverton Park; and, if at any time led to talk of her favourite greys, that the pastures they fed in, and the roads they traversed, should on no account be particularly specified. Neither her courage nor her hopes were at all lowered by this her first adventure; on the contrary, by setting her to consider from whence arose the blunder, it led her to believe that her danger had been occasioned solely by her own too great humility in not having soared high enough to seek her quarry.

"In making new acquaintance," thus ran her soliloquy—"in making new acquaintance, the rank and station of the party should be too unequivocal to render a repetition of such danger possible.... I was to blame in so totally neglecting the evident admiration of Colonel Hubert, in order to gratify the jealous feelings of Major Allen.... That was a man to whom I might have devoted myself without danger, his family and fortune known to all the world ... and himself so every way calculated to do me honour. But