“Really, it almost seems a judgment on her.” “What does?” “The stroke. It was too bad of her to make us suppose that the Honourable Arminell Inglett had come to live in such a quarter as this. Then you really believe, Mr. Welsh, that Lord Lamerton’s daughter died of the shock, when she heard of her father’s premature death?” “I saw it so stated in the papers, and they are generally well informed. What sort of a person was she? I ask you, as the Rector’s wife, was she worldly? Was she at all prepared for the great change?” Mrs. Cribbage shook her head. “I was afraid it was so,” said Welsh solemnly. “Then I should not be at all surprised if she also had gone to the same warm place as my poor nephew.” “It is not for us to judge,” said Mrs. Cribbage gravely; “still, if it be permitted us to look beyond the veil, I would not say but that she had. She was barely civil to me, once she was positively rude. Yes—I have no doubt that she also has gone—gone—” “To the same warm place,” added Welsh. CHAPTER LIII. ALLAH’S SLIPPER. Having occupied an entire chapter with dippers, it may seem to the reader to be acting in excess of what is just to revert in the ensuing chapter to the same topic; but if we mention dippers again, it is in another sense altogether. In an oriental tale, a sultan was unable to conceive how that a thousand days could seem to pass as a minute, or a minute be expanded into a thousand days. Then a magician bade a pail of water be brought into the royal presence, and invited the sultan to plunge his head into it. He did so, and at once found himself translated to a strange country where he was destitute of means of life, and was forced to support existence by hard labour as a porter. He married a wife, and became the father of seven children, after which his wife died, and as he was oppressed with old age and poverty, he plunged into a river to finish his woes, when—up came his head out of the pail of water. He stormed at the magician for having given him such a life of wretchedness. “But, sire,” said the magician, “your august head has been under water precisely three seconds.”