constitution. Her eyes did not appear so large now that her cheeks had rounded out and looked rosy. She did not take on the large broad freckles so common with fair-complexioned people in so hot a climate, but she had a little of the natural browning which a healthy girl cannot escape who lives much in the open air in Australia, and a curious eye might perceive a few dark small freckles across her nose and the upper region of her cheeks. But she was beyond question the beauty of the district, and if it had not been a thing generally understood that she was to be married to Allan Lindsay when she was old enough, she would have had a great deal of admiration in spite of her youth. Even with that understanding there were more than one or two callers who made a convenience of Branxholm hospitality in order to have a look at the handsome English girl, half daughter and half governess, Whose father's death had left her no better friend than old Hughie Lindsay, as old colonists still called him, in spite of his years and his means. Mrs. Hammond's conduct had been more than a nine days' wonder in a thinly-peopled district Where wonders were scarce; her name or Amy Staunton's name could never be mentioned without a reflection on her stinginess and her pride.
