le to do much work. It should not be difficult, for she repeated herself from day to day and yet did it with a quaint unreasonableness that was ever yield

ack-lead the grate, but that might rouse her daughter from whose side she has slipped so cunningly. She catches sight of the screen at the foot of the bed, and immediately her soft face becomes very determined. To guard her from draughts the screen had been brought here from the lordly east room, where it was of no use whatever. But in her opinion it was too beautiful for use; it belonged to the east room, where she could take pleasant peeps at it; she had objected to its removal, even become low-spirited. Now is her opportunity. The

t'neaded her with our talk about draughts-there were no such things as draughts in her young days-and it is more than she can do (here she again attempts to rise but we hold her down) to lie there and watch that beautiful screen being spoilt. I reply that the beauty of the screen has ever been its miserable defect: ho, there! for a knife with which to spoil its beauty and make the bedroom its fitting home. As there is no knife handy, my foot will do; I raise

ething is wrong with the clock. Next moment she is captured on her way downstairs to wind up the clock. So evidently we must be up and doing, and as we have no servant, my sister

t tenderly in a basin, and the starching of it, and the finger-iron for its exquisite frills that looked like curls of sugar, and the sweet bands with which it tied beneath the chin! The honoured snowy mutch, how I love to see it smiling to me from the doors and windows of the poor; it is always smiling-sometimes maybe a wavering wistful smile, as if a tear-drop lay hidden among, the frills. A hundred times I have

ever fall to pieces. It is mine now, and to me the black threads with which she stitched it are as part of the contents. Other books she read in the ordinary manner, but this one differently, her l

es and asking sternly where we have put that bonnet. On the whole she is behaving in a most exemplary way to-day (not once have we caught her trying to go out into the washing-house), and we compliment her at dinner-time, partly because she deserves it, and partly to make her think herself so good that she will eat something, just to maintain her new character. I question whether one hour of all her life was given to thoughts of food; in her great days to eat seemed to her to be waste of time, and afterwards she only ate to boast of

on their hands. That they enjoyed it she could not believe; it was merely a form of showing off, and as they passed her window she would remark to herself with blasting satire, 'Ay, Jeames, are you off for your walk?' and add fervently, 'Rather you than me!' I was one of those who walked, and though she smiled, and might drop a sarcastic word when she saw me putting on my boots, it was she who had heated them in preparation for my g

in bed, according to promise, but still I am sus

now,' she says, with a y

have you b

saw m

the window. Did you g

had that m

tru

aken a look at

mother who prevaricates. Have you

reab

that mean

and

been to th

d I do in t

have

ave looked up t

redding up th

u could call

believe you have not

ee me

jumped into bed when you

ver

d y

N

hen you heard

een when I heard

it be a Carlyle, and we move softly, she will read, entranced, for hours. Her delight in Carlyle was so well known that various good people would send her books that contained a page about him; she could place her finger on any passage wanted in the biography as promptly as though she were looking for some article in her own drawer, and given a d

a method of her own: 'What might be the age of Bell Tibbits? Well, she was born the week I bought the boiler, so she'll be one-and-fifty (no less!) come Martinmas.' Mrs. Carlyle had got into the train at a London station and was feeling very lonely, for the journey to Scotland lay before her and no one had come to see her off. Then, just as the train was starting, a man jumped into the carriage, to her regret until she saw his face, when, behold, they were old friends, and the last time they met (I forget how many year

arlyle must have made his wife a glori

d said to herself, "The whole world is r

nt out, 'he would roar

ere nor there.' But her verdict as a whole was, 'I

he scarcely included man), and she gratefully gave up reading 'leaders' the day I ceased to write them. But like want of reasonableness, a love for having the last word, want of humour and the like, politics were in her opinion a mannish attribute to be tolerated, and Gladstone was the name of the something which makes all our sex such queer characters. She had a profound faith in him as an aid to conversation, and if there were silent men in the company would give him to them to talk about, precisely as she divided a cake among children. And then, with a motherly smile, she would leave them to gorge on him. But in the idolising of Gladstone she recognised, nevertheless, a certain inevitability, and would no more have tried to con

pointed out; he did not like this Home Ru

ul clear, he rep

o him when he appeared before he

hetically, but without dropping her wires-for Home Rule or no Ho

hink the day would come,' and so on, but if he rose it was only to sit down again, and at last she crossed over to him and said softly, (no sarcasm in her voice now), 'Away with you, and vote for Gladstone's man!' He jumped up and

e moment to me, for I am at a sentence that will not write. I know, tho

e been in thrice since then, and every time he says, "In five minutes," and when I try to take the t

t weary

ther, so you must com

her says, but she rises smiling, a

waste-paper basket, which contains most of my work of the night and with a dear gesture she lifts up a torn page and kisses it. 'Poor

I begin, 'one can often do m

id it in my young da

ne who was prouder of her even than I; it is true, and yet almost

l put by your work now, man, and have your supper, and then you'll come up and sit be

little cry fro

have changed places,' she says; 'that was just

t, to leave her alone with God. She had been but a child when her mother died, and so she fell early into the way of saying her prayers with no earthly listener. Often and often I have found her on her knees, but I a