"Pleasure is not what I seek," said Norman.

"What is the matter with you?" said Tom. "You said I did not seem rejoiced--you look worse, I am sure." Tom put his arm on Norman's shoulder, and looked solicitously at him--demonstrations of affection very rare with him.

"I wonder which would really make you happiest, to have your own way, and go to these black villains--"

"Remember, that but for others who have done so, Harry--"

"Pshaw," said Tom, rubbing some invisible dust from his coat sleeve. "If it would keep you at home, I would say I never would hear of doctoring."

"I thought you had said so."

"What's the use of my coming here, if I'm to be a country doctor?"

"I have told you I do not mean to victimise you. If you have a distaste to it, there's an end of it--I am quite ready."

Tom gave a great sigh. "No," he said, "if I must, I must; I don't mind the part of it that you do. I only hate the name of it, and the being tied down to a country place like that, while you go out thousands of miles off to these savages; but if it is the only thing to content you, I wont stand in your way. I can't bear your looking disconsolate."

"Don't think yourself bound, if you really dislike the profession."

"I don't," said Tom. "It is my free choice. If it were not for horrid sick people, I should like it."

Promising! it must be confessed!

Perhaps Tom had expected Norman to brighten at once, but it was a fallacious hope. The gaining his point involved no pleasant prospect, and his young brother's moody devotion to him suggested scruples whether he ought to exact the sacrifice, though, in his own mind, convinced that it was Tom's vocation; and knowing that would give him many of the advantages of an eldest son.

Eton fully justified Hector's declaration that it would not regard the cut of Harry's coat. The hero of a lost ship and savage isle was the object of universal admiration and curiosity, and inestimable were the favours conferred by Hector and Tom in giving introductions to him, till he had shaken hands with half the school, and departed amid deafening cheers.

In spite of Harry, the day had been long and heavy to Norman, and though he chid himself for his depression, he shrank from the sight of Meta and Sir Henry Walkinghame together, and was ready to plead an aching head as an excuse for not appearing at the evening party; but, besides that this might attract notice, he thought himself bound to take care of Harry in so new a world, where the boy must be at a great loss.

"I say, old June," cried a voice at his door, "are you ready?"

"I have not begun dressing yet. Will you wait?"

"Not I. The fun is beginning."

Norman heard the light foot scampering downstairs, and prepared to follow, to assume the protection of him.

Music sounded as Norman left his room, and he turned aside to avoid the stream of company flowing up the flower-decked stairs, and made his way into the rooms through Flora's boudoir. He was almost dazzled by the bright lights, and the gay murmurs of the brilliant throng. Young ladies with flowers and velvet streamers down their backs, old ladies portly and bejewelled, gentlemen looking civil, abounded wherever he turned his eyes. He could see Flora's graceful head bending as she received guest after guest, and the smile with which she answered congratulations on her brother's return; but Harry he did not so quickly perceive, and he was trying to discover in what corner he might have hidden himself, when Meta stood beside him, asking whether their Eton journey had prospered, and how poor Hector was feeling at Harry's return.

"Where is Harry?" asked Norman. "Is he not rather out of his element?"

"No, indeed," said Meta, smiling. "Why, he is the lion of the night!"

"Poor fellow, how he must hate it!"

"Come this way, into the front room. There, look at him--is it not nice to see him, so perfectly simple and at his ease, neither shy nor elated?

And what a fine-looking fellow he is!"

Meta might well say so. The trim, well-knit, broad-chested form, the rosy embrowned honest face, the shining light-brown curly locks, the dancing well-opened blue eyes, and merry hearty smile showed to the best advantage, in array that even Tom would not have spurned, put on with naval neatness; and his attitude and manner were so full of manly ease, that it was no wonder that every eye rested on him with pleasure. Norman smiled at his own mistake, and asked who were the lady and gentleman conversing with him. Meta mentioned one of the most distinguished of English names, and shared his amusement in seeing Harry talking to them with the same frank unembarrassed ease as when he had that morning shaken hands with their son, in the capacity of Hector Ernescliffe's fag. No one present inspired him with a tithe of the awe he felt for a post-captain--it was simply a pleasant assembly of good-natured folks, glad to welcome home a battered sailor, and of pretty girls, for whom he had a sailor's admiration, but without forwardness or presumption--all in happy grateful simplicity.

"I suppose you cannot dance?" said Flora to him.

"I!" was Harry's interjection; and while she was looking round for a partner to whom to present him, he had turned to the young daughter of his new acquaintance, and had her on his arm, unconscious that George had been making his way to her.

Flora was somewhat uneasy, but the mother was looking on smiling, and expressed her delight in the young midshipman; and Mrs. Rivers, while listening gladly to his praises, watched heedfully, and was reassured to see that dancing was as natural to him as everything else; his steps were light as a feather, his movement all freedom and joy, without being boisterous, and his boyish chivalry as pretty a sight as any one could wish to see.

If the rest of the world enjoyed their dances a quarter as much as did "Mr. May," they were enviable people, and he contributed not a little to their pleasure, if merely by the sight of his blithe freshness and spirited simplicity, as well as the general sympathy with his sister's joy, and the interest in his adventures. He would have been a general favourite, if he had been far less personally engaging; as it was, every young lady was in raptures at dancing with him, and he did his best to dance with them all; and to try to stir up Norman, who, after Meta had been obliged to leave him, and go to act her share of the part of hostess, had disposed of himself against a wall, where he might live out the night.

"Ha! June! what makes you stand sentry there? Come and dance, and have some of the fun! Some of these girls are the nicest partners in the world. There's that Lady Alice, something with the dangling things in her hair, sitting down now--famous at a polka. Come along, I'll introduce you. It will do you good."

"I know nothing of dancing," said Norman, beginning to apprehend that he might be dragged off, as often he had been to cricket or football, and by much the same means.

"Comes by nature, when you hear the music. Ha! what a delicious polka!

Come along, or I must be off! She will be waiting for me, and she is the second prettiest girl here! Come!"

"I have been trying to make something of him, Harry," said the ubiquitous Flora, "but I don't know whether it is mauvaise honte, or headache."

"I see! Poor old June!" cried Harry. "I'll get you an ice at once, old fellow! Nothing like one for setting a man going!"

Before Norman could protest, Harry had flown off.

"Flora," asked Norman, "is--are the Walkinghames here?"

"Yes. Don't you see Sir Henry. That fine-looking man with the black moustache. I want you to know him. He is a great admirer of your prize poem and of Dr. Spencer."

Harry returning, administered his ice, and then darted off to excuse himself to his partner, by explanations about his brother, whom everybody must have heard of, as he was the cleverest fellow living, and had written the best prize poem ever heard at Oxford. He firmly believed Norman a much greater lion than himself.

Norman was forced to leave his friendly corner to dispose of the glass of his ice, and thus encountered Miss Rivers, of whom Sir Henry was asking questions about a beautiful collection of cameos, which Flora had laid out as a company trap.

"Here is Norman May," said Meta; "he knows them better than I do. Do you remember which of these is the head of Diana, Norman?"

Having set the two gentlemen to discuss them, she glided away on fresh hospitable duties, while Norman repeated the comments that he had so enjoyed hearing from poor Mr. Rivers, hoping he was, at least, sparing Meta some pain, and wondering that Flora should have risked hurting her feelings by exposing these treasures to the general gaze.

If Norman were wearied by Sir Henry, it was his own fault, for the baronet was a very agreeable person, who thought a first-class man worth cultivation, so that the last half-hour might have compensated for all the rest, if conversation were always the test.

"Why, Meta," cried Harry, coming up to her, "you have not once danced!

We are a sort of brother and sister, to be sure, but that is no hindrance, is it?"

"No," said Meta, smiling, "thank you, Harry, but you must find some one more worthy. I do not dance this season; at least, not in public. When we get home, who knows what we may do?"

"You don't dance! Poor little Meta! And you don't go out! What a pity!"

"I had rather not work quite so hard," said Meta. "Think what good fortune I had by staying at home last night!"

"I declare!" exclaimed Harry, bewitched by the beaming congratulation of her look, "I can't imagine why Norman had said you had turned into a fine lady! I can't see a bit of it!"

"Norman said I had turned into a fine lady!" repeated Meta. "Why?"