Harry Clayton's reply was a cold, bitterly reproachful look; but as the train glided out into the open air, he threw himself back, smiling sadly as he gazed with a newly-awakened interest at the dense and wretched neighbourhood on either hand, with its thronging population, and roofs devoted often to the keeping of birds, many of which were also hung from miserable poverty-stricken windows, whose broken panes were patched with paper or stuffed with rags. On went the train, momentarily gathering speed, till, as he saw one iridescent pigeon alight cooing upon a brick parapet, Harry Clayton's brow wrinkled, and he compressed his lips as if with pain. An instant and the train had glided by, and the pigeon was lost to view; and as he mused upon the troubles of the past, his broken home at Norwood, and his determination to leave London for a time, the young man whispered to himself softly-- "It's a dream--a dream of folly and weakness, and it was time that I was rudely awakened." Volume 2, Chapter IV. JARED'S HOME. "Well, Mr Ruggles, and how is little Pine?" said Mrs Jared, entering the room in Duplex Street, where industrious Tim was busily at work. "Don't know what to say, ma'am," said Tim; "but somehow I fancy she's better since I changed her oil. This one seems to agree with her different to what the last one did. Oils varies a deal." "No doubt," said Mrs Jared, smiling; "but I should have more faith in keeping her well wrapped up and out of the night air." "I do keep her out of it, ma'am," said Tim, talking away, but busy still over his work. "I take all the care I can of her; but what we want is warm weather to bring her round. Summer weather's what we want; and there's such a very little of it yet. It's like everything else in London, ma'am--terribly adulterated. The oil's adulterated, the milk's adulterated, bread's adulterated; everything is, ma'am, more or less, that we poor people buy; and I know we pay ten per cent, more for our things, ma'am, than the rich do; while, because things ain't bad enough for us, we get our fresh air stale and fouled with blacks. As for our summer, what we get of it, that's all adulterated with cold biting easterly winds. Summers seem to me, ma'am, to get shorter every year; but, for all that, I shall be glad when the summer does come." And then, to give emphasis to his remarks, Tim brought his iron down thump upon the floor where he was seated. Then there was a busy pause, during which time Jared was inspecting the lungs of a concertina, and, by means of his glue-pot, affixing soft patches of leather inside where failing spots were visible, Mrs Jared dividing her time between helping Patty over some garment and nursing the youngest Pellet, who sat watching Janet, staying with them for the evening.