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 the conversation was all about sport and horses, matters in which he was thoroughly at home, he could speak more freely and more naturally than he had yet done. There was not any personal element which would require him to be on guard and so cause constraint. The result was that Colonel Ogilvie got quite over his stiffness and began to warm to his genial influence.

It was quite a sign of his existing attitude that he now took on himself to say just what he had reprehended in his daughter:

"I am really sorry you can't come on the Graphic with us. It would make the voyage a new pleasure for us all!" As he spoke he took the young man's arm in a most friendly way; and to Joy's secret delight, they came in this wise into the drawing-room.