eagerness; but he could not express his feelings. He kissed each of them very tenderly and in silence, and then they were a little overcome. His library, also, though _very_ small, was as snug and comfortable as a bookworm could have desired. All the sides were covered with books, and in the middle were the library-table and armchair which he had used in Grosvenor Street, and which were, it must be owned, on too large a scale for the little room to which they had been removed. That this oppressed family were not incessantly and very painfully reminded of the contrast afforded by their present to their former circumstances, I do not pretend to assert; but it very, very seldom formed a topic of _conversation_ between any of them. When, however, the little bustle and occupation of arranging their house was over, and Mrs. Aubrey and Kate were left a good deal to themselves--Mr. Aubrey being either absent from home, or in his library, engaged in matters of the last importance to them all--then they would talk together with increasing eagerness and excitement about past times, and their recent troubles and bereavements; not displaying then--sweet souls!--_quite_ that degree of resignation and fortitude which they strove to exhibit in the presence of Mr. Aubrey. "Some natural tears they dropt, but wiped them soon." They passed a good deal of their time in-doors in needlework, _practical_ family needlework, an art in which they were not particularly accomplished, but which they quickly acquired from a seamstress whom they kept engaged constantly in the house for several weeks. Then sometimes they would sit down to the piano; at other times they would read--on all occasions, however, frequently falling into conversation on the all-engrossing topic of their expulsion from Yatton. Now and then, they could scarcely refrain from a melancholy smile, when they remarked upon their shrunken personal importance. "Really, Agnes," said one day Miss Aubrey, "I feel just as one can fancy a few poor newly shorn sheep must feel! So light and cold! So much _less_ than they were half an hour before! Surely they must hardly know what to make of themselves!" "Then, I suppose, mamma," said Charles, who was sitting on a stool beside them--making believe to write on a small slate--"I am a _little_ sheep?" They both looked at the child with silent tenderness, and presently thought of Him who "_tempers the wind_ to the shorn lamb."