before her elder sister, that all her faults blossomed out full and strong.  Sylvia felt her to be selfish; Mrs. Robson thought her not maidenly.  A year before she would have been far more missed and regretted by Sylvia; now it was almost a relief to the latter to be freed from the perpetual calls upon her sympathy, from the constant demands upon her congratulations, made by one who had no thought or feeling to bestow on others; at least, not in these weeks of ‘cock-a-doodle-dooing,’ as Mrs. Robson persisted in calling it.  It was seldom that Bell was taken with a humorous idea; but this once having hatched a solitary joke, she was always clucking it into notice—­to go on with her own poultry simile.

Every time during that summer that Philip saw his cousin, he thought her prettier than she had ever been before; some new touch of colour, some fresh sweet charm, seemed to have been added, just as every summer day calls out new beauty in the flowers.  And this was not the addition of Philip’s fancy.  Hester Rose, who met Sylvia on rare occasions, came back each time with a candid, sad acknowledgement in her heart that it was no wonder that Sylvia was so much admired and loved.

One day Hester had seen her sitting near her mother in the market-place; there was a basket by her, and over the clean cloth that covered the yellow pounds of butter, she had laid the hedge-roses and honeysuckles she had gathered on the way into Monkshaven; her straw hat was on her knee, and she was busy placing some of the flowers in the ribbon that went round it.  Then she held it on her hand, and turned it round about, putting her head on one side, the better to view the effect; and all this time, Hester, peeping at her through the folds of the stuffs displayed in Foster’s windows, saw her with admiring, wistful eyes; wondering, too, if Philip, at the other counter, were aware of his cousin’s being there, so near to him.  Then Sylvia put on her hat, and, looking up at Foster’s windows, caught Hester’s face of interest, and smiled and blushed at the consciousness of having been watched over her little vanities, and Hester smiled back, but rather sadly.  Then a customer came in, and she had to attend to her business, which, on this as on all market days, was great.  In the midst she was aware of Philip rushing bare-headed out of the shop, eager and delighted at something he saw outside.  There was a little looking-glass hung against the wall on Hester’s side, placed in that retired corner, in order that the good women who came to purchase head-gear of any kind might see the effect thereof before they concluded their bargain.  In a pause of custom, Hester, half-ashamed, stole into this corner, and looked at herself in the glass.  What did she see? a colourless face, dark soft hair with no light gleams in it, eyes that were melancholy instead of smiling, a mouth compressed with a sense of dissatisfaction.  This was what she had to compare with the bright bonny face in the sunlight outside.  She gave a gulp to check the sigh that was rising, and came back, even more patient than she had been before this disheartening peep, to serve all the whims and fancies of purchasers.