“Oh! have you e’er heard of the famed Captain Wattle?” and Gawtrey broke out into a loud Bacchanalian hymn, in which Philip could find no mirth, and from which the songster suddenly paused to exclaim:-- “Mind you say nothing about Fanny to Birnie; my secrets with him are not of that nature. He could not hurt her, poor lamb! it is true--at least, as far as I can foresee. But one can never feel too sure of one’s lamb, if one once introduces it to the butcher!” The next day being Sunday, the bureau was closed, and Philip and Gawtrey repaired to the convent. It was a dismal-looking place as to the exterior; but, within, there was a large garden, well kept, and, notwithstanding the winter, it seemed fair and refreshing, compared with the polluted streets. The window of the room into which they were shown looked upon the green sward, with walls covered with ivy at the farther end. And Philip’s own childhood came back to him as he gazed on the quiet of the lonely place. The door opened--an infant voice was heard, a voice of glee--of rapture; and a child, light and beautiful as a fairy, bounded to Gawtrey’s breast. Nestling there, she kissed his face, his hands, his clothes, with a passion that did not seem to belong to her age, laughing and sobbing almost at a breath. On his part, Gawtrey appeared equally affected: he stroked down her hair with his huge hand, calling her all manner of pet names, in a tremulous voice that vainly struggled to be gay. At length he took the toys he had brought with him from his capacious pockets, and strewing them on the floor, fairly stretched his vast bulk along; while the child tumbled over him, sometimes grasping at the toys, and then again returning to his bosom, and laying her head there, looked up quietly into his eyes, as if the joy were too much for her. Morton, unheeded by both, stood by with folded arms. He thought of his lost and ungrateful brother, and muttered to himself: “Fool! when she is older, she will forsake him!” Fanny betrayed in her face the Italian origin of her father. She had that exceeding richness of complexion which, though not common even in Italy, is only to be found in the daughters of that land, and which harmonised well with the purple lustre of her hair, and the full, clear iris of the dark eyes. Never were parted cherries brighter than her dewy lips; and the colour of the open neck and the rounded arms was of a whiteness still more dazzling, from the darkness of the hair and the carnation of the glowing cheek. Suddenly Fanny started from Gawtrey’s arms, and running up to Morton, gazed at him wistfully, and said, in French: