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256 said the Squire's wife, who had read some modern novels, and therefore did not talk of Providence.

"No doubt there are instances," assented the blind man patiently, and he wondered vaguely why the third lady whom they had indistinctly mentioned to him on their arrival had not spoken at all. He had not lost his sight long, and it worried him to be unable to attach any kind of personality to her.

"Loss of physical sight may sometimes mean a gain of spiritual perception," the Rector's wife laboured onwards. She sometimes copied out her husband's sermons for him, and she had dropped unawares into the phraseology.

"It is to be hoped there are compensations," said her host, and he turned towards the sofa where he imagined his unknown guest to be sitting.

The third lady spoke at last.

"I suppose there's some good in being blind, as you both seem to think so, but I don't know where it comes in, I'm sure; and I'm perfectly certain nothing can make up for it for all that," she said, not very clearly; but the novelist hailed her incoherence with relief, and recognised the human note in it.

"Nothing can," he said, and nodded in her direction.

The third lady went on:

"I wonder, have you tried Dr. Middleton?" His countenance fell again. After all, she was only like everybody else.

"Oh no, I haven't tried him, nor any one else you are likely to mention," he answered with a touch of impatience.

"Haven't you, really? Now I call that rather a pity; don't you?"

"Oh, very likely," he said indifferently, and waited for them to go. The Squire's wife was the first to move, and she pressed his hand warmly and made the unnecessary remark that her