‘No,’ replied the old lady, giving it to him mechanically. Oliver glanced at it, and saw that it was directed to Harry Maylie, Esquire, at some great lord’s house in the country; where, he could not make out.

‘Shall it go, ma’am?’ asked Oliver, looking up, impatiently.

‘I think not,’ replied Mrs. Maylie, taking it back. ‘I will wait until to-morrow.’

With these words, she gave Oliver her purse, and he started off, without more delay, at the greatest speed he could muster.

Swiftly he ran across the fields, and down the little lanes which sometimes divided them: now almost hidden by the high corn on either side, and now emerging on an open field, where the mowers and haymakers were busy at their work: