She sat before the ladies from Bross, Hugh Finlay's only confidante.

She sat handsome and upheld and not altogether penetrable, a kind of gipsy to their understanding, though indeed the Romany strain in her was beyond any divining of theirs.

They, on their part, reposed in their clothes with all their bristles out--what else could have been expected of them ?--convinced in their own minds that they had come not only to a growing but to a forward country.
Mrs Kilbannon was perhaps a little severe.

"I wonder that we have not heard of you, Miss Murchison," said she, "but we are happy to make the acquaintance of any of my nephew's friends.

You will have heard him preach, perhaps ?" "Often," said Advena, rising.