She darted from the window and stood panting in the middle of the room.

The next minute Mrs.Easton entered the sitting-room all in a flutter, and beckoned her.

Mary flew to her.
"He is here." "I thought he would be." "Will you meet him down-stairs ?" "No, here." Mrs.Easton acquiesced, rapidly closed the folding-doors, and went out, saying, "Try and calm yourself, Miss Mary." Miss Mary tried to obey her, but Walter rushed in impetuously, pale, worn, agitated, yet enraptured at the first sight of her, and Mary threw herself round his neck in a moment, and he clasped her fluttering bosom to his beating heart, and this was the natural result of the restraint they had put upon a passionate affection: for what says the dramatist Destouches, improving upon Horace, so that in England his immortal line is given to Moliere.

"_Chassez le naturel, il revient au galop_." The next thing was, they held each other at arm's-length, and mourned over each other.
"Oh, my poor Mary, how ill you look!" "Oh, my poor Walter, how pale and worn!" "It's all my fault," said Mary.
"No; it's all mine," said Walter.
And so they blamed themselves, and grieved over each other, and vowed that come what might they would never part again.

But, lo and behold! Walter went on from that to say: "And that we may never part again let us marry at once, and put our happiness out of the reach of accidents." "What!" said Mary.