"It will be very pleasant for you, grandfather," said she, "to have so intelligent and interesting a neighbour—don’t you think so? For though he is young, he seems to know everything, and to have been everywhere; and I am sure, you and he, grandfather, found plenty of things to talk about. I have just been wondering whether it is possible he could have come to Toronto while we were living there. Wouldn’t that have been strange? Perhaps we have passed him while we were walking along King-street; perhaps he may have come round the corner by the Bank of Montreal when we were going into Yonge-street—and not a yard between us! But no," she continued, musingly, "I hardly imagine it could have been. I think I should have noticed him, and remembered. Don’t you think you would have noticed him, grandfather? He is not like any one else—I mean he is not the kind of person you would pass in the street without remarking—I don’t think you would forget. Oh, yes, I am very glad for your sake, grandfather, that you have made his acquaintance; and I hope you will become good friends—although he is young. You want some one to talk to—and not that dreadful Hobson—I can’t bear your talking to Hobson, grandfather—" "I am no respecter of persons, Maisrie," said the old man, pompously, "so long as people know their place, and keep it." "But that is just the worst of Hobson, grandfather!" she exclaimed. "His fawning and cringing is so despicable. He is not a man at all. And you should tell him the truth about those verses of his, grandfather: I can’t imagine how you see anything in them—" "There have been worse—there have been worse," said Mr. Bethune, with a magnanimous toleration. "And on the two occasions on which I got the _Chronicle_ to let him see himself in print, the gratitude of the poor creature was quite pathetic. A little act of kindness is never thrown away, Maisrie, my dear. So now you’ll just get out your violin, and for a little while we will cross the Border, and forget that we are here in the heart of this stifling London." But Maisrie begged to be excused. She said she was rather tired, and was going back to her own room very soon. And indeed, when she had brought her grandfather his accustomed hot water, and sugar, and spirits, and generally made everything comfortable for him, she kissed him and bade him good night and went away upstairs. It was not to go to bed, however. Having lit the gas, she proceeded to hunt among her books until she discovered a little album entitled "Views of Toronto;" and having spread that open on her dressing-table, she drew in a chair, and, with her elbows resting on the table, and her head between her hands, began to pore over those pictures of the long thoroughfares and the pavements and the public buildings. She seemed to find the rather ill-executed lithographs interesting—so interesting that we may leave her there with her eyes fixed intently on the brown pages.