was esteemed as a virtue, and enmity to the church was regarded as a crime. For a time, Ralph Milbourne quitted Norfolk for a residence in the metropolis, which his pecuniary transactions with the leaders of his party rendered necessary. London was in the hands of the Round-heads. A splendid mansion in Aldermanbury, the sequestered property of a cavalier nobleman, was bestowed upon him by the parliament; and Helen Milbourne, far removed from any chance or hope of seeing the only man for whom she had ever entertained the slightest affection, was placed at the head of a magnificent establishment, and compelled to play the courteous hostess, as mistress of her father’s house, to men who were bent on the overthrow of everything which her natural sense of right, and above all, her love for Edward Dagworth, taught her to hold dear,—men, too, who mentioned the name of that distinguished partisan of loyalty, as he was now considered, with hostility, who panted for his blood, and had vowed his death either in the field or on the scaffold.

And from some of these she was compelled to listen to solicitations of marriage backed by paternal authority; and though she had hitherto been permitted to put a decided negative on all their pretensions, yet, with reason, she apprehended a time would come when she would be denied the privilege of refusing some abhorrent candidate for her hand. Her cheek lost its bloom, and her eye its brightness. Her father observed the change, and became anxious on account of her health.

“I want to breathe the fresh air and enjoy the quiet retirement of the country,” she replied to his inquiry.

Her father took her to a seat purchased for the occasion in one of the beautiful villages near London; where he visited her every day, bringing home with him such of his political friends as he was desirous of uniting in still stronger bonds of fellowship with himself and family. This species of society was as distasteful to Helen as the London residence; and though her father employed every art and luxury that taste and ingenuity could suggest or wealth procure to adorn her new abode, his daughter still appeared listless and dissatisfied with all his arrangements; and when he asked her if she did not like it, she replied,—

“It is not Norfolk, and it is thither I wish to go—to our own house, where I was so free and happy.”

“You are a foolish girl,” her father rejoined, and left her in displeasure.

The next time he came to see her he brought one of the most eminent physicians of the day to visit her; who, as soon as he had conversed with the invalid, prescribed the very thing she required—Norfolk air.

Ralph Milbourne was out of humour. It was very inconvenient to him to leave London; but Helen was his only child, and had been, of course, a spoiled child hitherto, invariably accustomed to the full indulgence of her will: so he agreed that she should follow it once more; and, much against his own inclination, conducted her to his Norfolk residence.

The very sight of the place put him into a fit of the spleen. It had not been inhabited for four years, and the country people had testified their affection to Sir Reginald Dagworth, and their dislike to him, by demolishing his windows and delapidating his ornamental buildings in his absence. The garden had become a wilderness; his park had almost degenerated into commonage; his fences and enclosures were all broken down; and, in short, everything bore evidence of the evil odour in which his memory had been held.

Even Helen felt uncomfortable at the aspect of the place, though she endeavoured to conceal the impression it created.

At that unhappy period of disorganisation and anarchy, it was no easy matter to procure efficient workmen to repair the damage that had been committed. Ralph Milbourne was precise and particular in all his habits; and since his re-entrance into public life he had acquired a taste for luxury and ease quite at variance with the state of his Norfolk mansion. He reproached his daughter for having been the means of bringing him to such a scene of discomfort—reviled his steward for having permitted his property