and she was now as nothing to them! Ah well! she should be grateful that in this chilly world there were some filial Toms' to pay with interest back the care and love of good, unselfish parents. She should remember, too, that to such instances as these, there are strange contrasts-for was not her uncle's and her cousin's case a warning and a sore example? Alone they were, and poor, with not a child to love and cherish them, for selfishness had marked their every action, and therefore in their age they were abandoned and forsaken.

Susan's mother had perchance seemed cold and stern, and poor Josiah wrapped up overmuch in business cares, but still for both of them their children nourished deep respect, and in their heart of hearts they knew that their parents' love, deep and untiring for those they had given birth to, was the wellspring of their every action, and often the excuse for many a seeming fault.

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CHAPTER XVII.

'And how the sprites of injur'd men
Shriek upward from the sod―
Aye, how the ghostly hand will point
To show the burial sod;

And unknown facts of guilty acts,

Are seen in dreams of God.'-HOOD.

IT was about this period, and when Miss Llewellen had just begun to submit with tolerable patience to being drawn about in a bath-chair in the Regent's Park (for she thought it such an act of inhumanity to impose so hard a task upon the overworked of the other sex, and long resisted this-to hernovel mode of conveyance);—it was about this time, we repeat, that Mr. Thomson requested-it was a rare event with him— permission from his mistress to absent himself for a few hours from his duties.

6

Nothing the matter, I hope, Thomson, at home?' said Miss Llewellen, in her gentle voice.

'Nothing, ma'am, I'm obliged to you only a little business in the country. A brother's child, ma'am; a little orphan that I couldn't but take to, seeing that its parents didn't do their duties by it-poor little fellow!-and it was hard to see it starve along of having no one to look after it.'

'You did quite right,' said Miss Christina, with a mild and encouraging look of approbation which she nothing doubted would go straight to the heart of the excellent man who had so well merited her praise. 'You did quite right, I'm sure, Thomson;' and here Miss Llewellen rose, and walked feebly towards her writing-table, and if this little help'-she was writing now-with a shaking hand, certainly; but Miss Christina's signature was well-known and honoured at her banker's, even though the characters with which her name was written

chanced to be a little weak and wandering; and if this little help' (the butler's eyes were keenly fixed upon the delicate fingers as they held the pen) 'can aid you in your charitable work, I am too glad to have it in my power to assist you.'

The cheque was for five pounds, and Thomson accepted it with his usual air of obsequious importance.

'I'm very grateful, ma'am, for little Johnny, and take it as a loan.'

'No, Thomson, take it altogether.

You're

most welcome. One never feels these things. It's pleasant to do good.'

'It's a loan to the Lord, ma'am,' said the butler, with a face of pretended piety; and you will be repaid tenfold, ma'am, as I believe, for your goodness to the fatherless child this day.'

Miss Chrissy's eyes were moistened by a tear, as the faithful retainer pronounced this blessing on her head. Her sight was dimmed perhaps, or she might have seen

(this story is a veracious one, so we dare not hide the fact) a certain closing of the good man's dexter eye, the effect of habit probably, but which quickly followed on the pious words he'd spoken.

'You need not hurry home,' said Miss Llewellen, kindly; we shall do very well; and, Thomson, don't forget your wife would like some jelly. It's very nourishing when the chest is delicate, and say I hope she'll soon get better of her sickness.'

If anyone imagines that when Mr. Andrew Thomson left his butler's pantry with a carpet-bag under his arm, in which carpet-bag was a small but ancient family tea-pot, of solid silver, and half-a-dozen teaspoons of the same material; if anyone imagines, we repeat, that under those circumstances the said Mr. Andrew Thomson experienced the slightest warning of self-reproach, he or she that so imagines is signally mistaken.

On the contrary, he issued forth trium