I half feared he was vexed, but he was not, for when Deborah brought in the tea-tray, with the addition of fried ham and eggs, Cornelius, instead of putting me away, kept me on his knee. "The O'Reillys always had good appetites," observed Miss O'Reilly, who stood looking on, enjoying the vigour with which her brother attacked her good-cheer. "Daisy, what are you perched up there for? Come down directly." "Stay, Daisy," said Cornelius, "you are not in my way." And indeed, from the fashion in which everything vanished before him, I do not think I was. But Miss O'Reilly was of a different opinion, for she resumed impatiently-- "Now, Cornelius, you need not feed that child from your plate; she left half her own tea, and she drinks yours, because it is yours." Cornelius was holding his cup to my lips. He smiled, and kissed me. "Yes, pet her now," said Kate, "after getting her unjustly punished." "It was thoughtless of me--I beg her pardon." "I don't want you to beg my pardon," I replied, looking a little indignantly at his sister. "I think if he were to beat you, you would enjoy it," was her short answer. His meal was over; he had removed from the table to the sofa; but he had not put me away. Miss O'Reilly looked at us from her place, and evidently could not make it out. "Are there to be no lessons?" she asked at length. "No, this is a holiday." "Shall there be no singing?" "I am tired." He was not too tired to talk to me, and make me talk, to an extent that induced Miss O'Reilly to exclaim-- "I thought the child was a mouse, and she turns out to be a magpie." She spoke shortly, but he kept me still. "Decidedly," said Kate, after vainly waiting for me to be put away, "decidedly, if one were to meet you in China or Japan, that little pale face would be somewhere about you." He said it was a little pale face, but that it had fine eyes, and he caressed her who owned it, very kindly. "Nonsense!" observed his sister, frowning. "She is so shy," he pleaded. "Pretty shyness, indeed!" replied Kate, as she saw me, with the sudden familiarity of childhood, pass my arm around the neck of her brother, and rest my head on his shoulder. "Daisy, it is bed-time." She rose, but I could not bear to leave Cornelius on the first evening of his kindness. I clasped my two hands around his neck, and looked beseechingly in his face. "Another quarter of an hour, Kate," he said. "Not another minute," she replied, taking my hand, for I lingered in his embrace like our mother Eve in Eden. "If you are good." she added, to comfort me, "you shall stay up half an hour longer as the days increase." "But they are shortening now," I said, mournfully. "Let her stay up for this one evening," entreated Cornelius, "to make up for her dull day in the back-parlour." Miss O'Reilly allowed herself to be mollified; but as she returned to her place and sat down, she said emphatically, looking at the fire--