to begin to dress with the air of being quite unable for the exertion, or to fling herself down upon the sofa in the lassitude of the dressing-gown, unable to move. She decided for the first of these processes. It would touch Mary more to see her preparing to do her duty at any price, than merely to witness the collapse which perhaps she would not have such complete faith in as was desirable. Accordingly Letitia rose. She pulled out the first dress that came to hand in her wardrobe. Not to diminish the effect, she waited until Mary might be supposed to be approaching. She then hurried out of her dressing-gown, and began to put on her usual clothes, and was found by Mary, on her hurried entry, half fallen upon the sofa, panting and breathless, fastening, with hands that trembled and seemed hardly capable of performing their functions, her under-garments. Mary made an outcry of surprise when she entered the room, and the maid who followed made a dart at her mistress with a scream--“Madame, you’re not fit to dress or go downstairs.” “What can I do?” said Letitia, with little pants between each two words, “when I am so much wanted--when I must--I must.” “Oh! what is the matter, Letitia? Can’t I do it for you?” said Mary, in her impulsive way. “You may go away, Felicie. Miss Hill will help me if I want any help.” “Oh, Mary, don’t you know what is the matter? Shut the door after that prying woman. They all want to have their noses in everything. It’s Ralph,” said Mrs. Parke, throwing herself back on the sofa as in despair. “He has not gone away after all, and Frogmore has come. Oh, Mary! when I begged and implored you upon my knees to get him away, and not to let him meet Frogmore.” Letitia threw herself back on her sofa while in the act of tying a pair of necessary strings. Her hands were trembling very perceptibly. She dropped the strings and flung her arms over her head in an outburst of tragical distress. Mary, on her part, had retired in tears from her interview with Ralph, and had shut herself into the little back room, which was all, in the present crowded state of the house, that she could call her own, with much real agitation and distress. But when she saw Letitia press those conspicuously trembling fingers on her face, the sight of her friend’s trouble was more than she could bear. “Oh, Letitia,” she said, “I am so sorry for you--what can I do? If there is anything I can do, tell me. I did speak to him. I begged him to go away, and he said he would. Oh, if there is anything more I can do I will do it. But don’t kill yourself, don’t take on so dreadfully. Don’t, oh don’t think so much of it, Letitia; Ralph----”