attendant after-pains--for they come--should be vouchsafed to a unit amidst tens of thousands! Mrs. Channing sat waiting for him; the tea standing before her, herself thoughtful. The room was of good size and handsomely furnished, its chairs and curtains of rich purple cloth. Their furniture had been a present from Mr. Huntley when they married, who was not one to do things niggardly. As Mrs. Channing sat, facing the inner door, the windows were behind her; the fireplace, with its ornaments and its large chimney-glass on her left; a piano on one side it, a white marble-topped cabinet with purple silk lining to its glass-doors on the other; and on her right, stood the sideboard, and other furniture. The inner room, used exclusively by Hamish for writing, had horsehair chairs, and a bookcase running all along the side of the wall. The door opened, and Hamish came in. He had a small bundle in his hand; proof sheets done up for the post, and sent them out at once by the maid, as he sat down to tea. Which he seemed inclined to swallow at a gulp, and to eat his piece of bread-and-butter wholesale, ever anxious to get back to his labour and the glowing visions of promise connected with it. "Hamish, I do believe you like your writing better than you like me!" Ellen said to him one day almost passionately. And for answer, Mr. Hamish in his sauciness had said he was not sure but he did. He sat there at tea, now, talking gaily as usual. His wife interrupted him, telling of the letter she had received, and its unfavourable news. He listened with his sunny smile. "I had great mind not to tell you at all, Hamish," she confessed. "Papa's temperament is nearly as sanguine as yours; and if he writes in poor spirits, saying he fears it may turn out that he is a ruined man, I know things must be very bad." "But why have hesitated to tell me, Ellen?" "To save you anxiety. Don't you see what it implies? If papa loses his property, the fortune that would have been mine sometime will be lost too." Had she been speaking of the probable loss of some mere trifle, he could scarcely have heard it with more equanimity. It seemed to Hamish that the future was, according to human foresight, in his own hands. "Never mind, Ellen, we have a resource that cannot be lost. I will take care of you, Heaven aiding me; you shall have every needful and substantial good in abundance." "Yes, that is just it. You work too much already: you would work more then." Hamish laughed. "Do you know what I wish, Ellen? I wish the day were four-and-twenty hours long instead of twelve, and that I had two sets of brains and hands." "How are you getting on?" "Oh, so well. It is all right, my darling. And will be."