phraseology is his. He hadn't done anything to deserve the character imputed to him in language he could identify by the style as Aunt Priscilla's, shorn of much of its Scriptural character. It incensed him, and caused him to write a letter which widened the breach between them. Then she wrote back, and the breach fairly yawned. There is nothing so effective as correspondence to consolidate a quarrel. She had been at all times since her marriage a frequent visitor enough at Athabasca Villa for the inquisitiveness of her Aunt's circle of friends to remain unexcited; for a week or so, at any rate. But that good lady's unholy alacrity in disclaiming all knowledge of her niece's domestic affairs stimulated a premature curiosity. When the Peter Dudburys called, Aunt Priscilla might quite easily have said, in reply to Mrs. Peter Dudbury's "And how is the Artist?" that she believed the said Artist was enjoying good health. Instead of which she was seized with a sort of paroxysm, exclaiming very often: "Don't ask me! I know nothing whatever about it. Nuth, thing-what, ever!" and shaking her head with her eyes tight shut. Whereupon Ellen Jane Dudbury said, "Shishmar!" and stamped cruelly on her mother's foot. Now really that amiable woman had only expanded into her gushy inquiry after Mr. Aiken because she knew that she and her three daughters had asked more than once after everyone else. She felt hurt, and resolved to have it out with Ellen Jane, and indeed began to do so as soon as they were out of hearing. "Wellmar," said Ellen Jane, "what is one to do when you won't take the slightest notice?" She went on to explain that any person of normal shrewdness would have seen, the moment Mrs. Aiken made excuses and went upstairs, that there was something. You could always see when there was anything if you chose to use your eyes. It was no use telling her--Ellen Jane, that is--that there was nothing. She knew better. It was complimentary to Ellen Jane's penetration that her mother and sisters hoped aloud at the next house where they called, and captured the tenants to inquire after them, that there really was nothing between young Mrs. Aiken and her husband, and most likely it was all fancy, because there was nothing whatever to go upon, and such absurd stories did get about. To our thinking it is clear that the receptivity of the Peter Dudburys was caused by that paroxysm of Aunt Priscilla's. An adoption of a like attitude with other visitors tended to enrich the gossip of Coombe and Maiden at the expense of Mrs. Euphemia Aiken.