There was a specimen or two to be heard of the London cries; but there was no music in them, and they fell upon the ear with a strangely unpleasant effect, intermingled with the occasional sound of a street organ. Penelope strained her attention to listen to the music, and it was pleasant to her, though the images which it raised in her mind were those only of sad regrets. There is more effect produced by those street organs than people in general are aware of. Shall we be pardoned the strangeness of the expression, if we say that they sometimes give a wholesome agitation to the stagnation of the moral atmosphere? And shall we be still farther pardoned if we digress, for the sake of illustrating by an anecdote the above singular expression? By such a digression we are not interrupting our narrative, which is now indeed, like its pensive heroine, standing still. A father had lost an affectionate and promising child, over whose long lingering illness he had watched anxiously but hopelessly. The poor child had suffered patiently, but had experienced some intervals of ease, and some sensations even of delight. A popular melody had caught his fancy, and when the wandering organist of that neighbourhood played his favourite air, the little sufferer's eyes would brighten, and his pale transparent hand would beat the time as knowingly as an amateur. That was a scene for a parent to recollect. And the poor little one died, and the father, when he had seen the grave closed upon the child's remains, returned to his home in a state of apathy: feeling seemed to have perished in him. The organist made his accustomed round, played the favourite air; the bereaved father was awakened to the agony of remembrance, and those tears flowed freely and spontaneously, which told that feeling had not departed. By the itinerant musicians the feelings of Penelope were awakened; but she could not help observing how much less emotion she experienced than formerly, when these well-known melodies brought to her mind thoughts of the absent and the distant. Her mind was otherwise engaged and her thoughts otherwise directed. Little did she imagine, when she had been anxiously expecting and joyfully anticipating her father's return to England, that so dark a cloud would obscure the first dawn of her happiness. While she was thus wearing away the slowly moving hours, the door of the apartment was opened and Lord Spoonbill made his appearance.