rustic eye.

The labourer shook his head as he hurried quickly away. He had
daughters of his own, and the Rector had been kind when one of those
daughters had suddenly come home from service, ill, and with no
prospect of another place.

"A-holdin' of hands and a-castin' of sheep's eyes," said he. "We knows
what that's the beginnings of! Well, well, youth's the season for
silliness, but there's bounds--there's bounds. And all of a mornin' so
early too. Lord above knows what it wouldn't be like of a evenin'." He
shook his head again, and made haste.

Vernon had forced his eyes to leave the face of Betty.

"Your fortune," he was saying, "is, curiously enough, just one of
those fortunes I was speaking of. You will have great chances of
happiness, if you have the courage to take them. You will cross the
sea. You've never travelled, have you?"

"No,--never further than Torquay; I was at school there, you know; and
London, of course. But I should love it. Isn't it horrid to think that
one might grow quite old and never have been anywhere or done
anything?"

"That depends on oneself, doesn't it? Adventures are to the
adventurous."

"Yes, that's all very well--girls can't be adventurous."