“And eh, mem! far mair than that,” said Lizzie, making a fresh start, “he brought back the very same letter just as it was--it might be because the leddy was out, or I dinna ken what it might be; but I saw him gi’e it back to the gentleman. And the gentleman, instead of being angry, he just took the letter and shook his head, and set fire to it at the candle. The door was open, and I saw him do it as I came up the stairs. It gaed to my heart to see him burning the good letter,” said Lizzie; “there was, maybe, something in’t that somebody might have likit to hear.” “But, Lizzie, don’t you know nobody has any business with a letter except the person who wrote it, and the person it is addressed to?” said I. I spoke, I confess, in an admonitory spirit. We did not get very many letters, but Harry was sadly careless of those he did get. “Eh, but foreigners are no like other folk,” cried Lizzie; “there’s something awfu’ queer in burning a letter, and it a’ sealed up. I couldna find it in my heart;--and when it’s a long story, it’s awfu’ fickle to understand Domenico, the half o’ what he says.” Lizzie ended with a sigh of unsatisfied curiosity. Perhaps, if I could have done it, I might have been as anxious to cross-question Domenico as she. CHAPTER IV. Our little journey was arranged by Aunt Milly in the most comfortable way she could think of for us. Harry would not consent to let her send the carriage all the way. The railway was close to us, and it passed about two miles from the Park, where there was a little station; and the carriage was to meet us there. It was a very short journey, certainly; but I remember when we were all in the train,--all--every one of us,--a family entire and close together,--and especially at the moment when we were passing through the tunnel, and felt in the darkness more entirely separated from the world,--a sudden thought seized upon me: “Oh, if we were only going on, anywhere, anywhere to the end of the world!” Plunging through the darkness, with Harry sitting close by me, and baby on my knee, and nobody able to approach or stop us--going on all together! All sorts of people have their fancies, no doubt. I daresay mine were very homely ones; but I shall never forget the strange thrill that came upon my heart as this wild possibility seized me. When we came slowly into the daylight, and the train stopped, and the door of the carriage flew open, and dear Aunt Milly herself appeared to welcome us, I woke up with a little shiver into real life again. Ah me! one cannot dart into the bowels of the earth and hide one’s self. But life and duty somehow looked cold at me with their piercing daylight eyes after that thought.