“If you mean, Dinah, that I'm to cut off that miserable pittance--that forty pounds a year--I give to poor George's girl--” He stopped, for he saw that in his sister's face which might have appalled a bolder heart than his own; for while her eyes flashed fire, her thin lips trembled with passion; and so, in a very faltering humility, he added: “But you never meant _that_ sister Dinah. You would be the very last in the world to do it.” “Then why impute it to me; answer me that?” said she, crossing her hands behind her back, and staring haughtily at him. “Just because I 'm clean at my wits' end,--just because I neither understand one word I hear, or what I say in reply. If you 'll just tell me what it is you propose, I 'll do my best, with God's blessing, to follow you; but don't ask me for advice, Dinah, and don't fly out because I 'm not as quick-witted and as clever as yourself.” There was something almost so abject in his misery that she seemed touched by it, and, in a voice of a very calm and kindly meaning, she said,-- “I have been thinking a good deal over that letter of Josephine's; she says she wants our consent to take the veil as a nun; that, by the rules of the order, when her novitiate is concluded, she must go into the world for at least some months,--a time meant to test her faithfulness to her vows, and the tranquillity with which she can renounce forever all the joys and attractions of life. We, it is true, have no means of surrounding her with such temptations; but we might try and supply their place by some less brilliant but not less attractive ones. We might offer her, what we ought to have offered her years ago,--a home! What do you say to this, Peter?” “That I love you for it, sister Dinah, with all my heart,” said he, kissing her on each cheek; “that it makes me happier than I knew I ever was to be again.” “Of course, to bring Josephine here, this must not be an inn, Peter.” “Certainly not, Dinah,--certainly not. But I can think of nothing but the joy of seeing her,--poor George's child I How I have yearned to know if she was like him,--if she had any of his ways, any traits of that quaint, dry humor he had, and, above all, of that disposition that made him so loved by every one.” “And cheated by every one too, brother Peter; don't forget that!” “Who wants to think of it now?” said he, sorrowfully. “I never reject a thought because it has unpleasant associations. It would be but a sorry asylum which only admitted the well-to-do and the happy.” “How are we to get the dear child here, Dinah? Let us consider the matter. It is a long journey off.” “I have thought of that too,” said she, sententiously, “but not made up my mind.” “Let us ask M'Cormick about it, Dinah; he's coming up this evening to play his Saturday night's rubber with Dill. He knows the Continent well.”