it was not dissimilar. She felt that there must have been a moment in which he thought of her and of “the bairns.” Mrs. Dalyell added that to the imaginary scene--a moment in which, as people said was the case in drowning, all his life would rush through his brain, and he would think of her as he died. They had the best of it. Their innocent thoughts conceived no ulterior scheme, no darkness of doubt. Had they realised that any such doubt existed, it is probable that they would have canonised poor Robert Dalyell on the spot as a hero and martyr, dying for those he loved, and still never have thought of the insurance companies; but, happily, no such imagination entered at all into their simple thoughts. The household had settled down completely into the habits of its new life, when Fred Dalyell came home from a long wandering tour he had made about Europe, not so much for love of travelling or desire to see beautiful things and places, as to distract his mind from the miserable thoughts that had gained so complete an empire over him. He had succeeded very well in that, for the most persistent trouble yields to such treatment at twenty; but the first return to Yalton, and all the recollections that were waiting for him under those familiar trees, brought back on the first coming much of the old trouble to the lad’s sensitive mind. It was now May, and Yalton was almost as cheerful as ever, though in a subdued way. The girls, “poor things,” as their mother said, had recovered their spirits. They were so young!--and Fred’s coming home had been a thing much looked for, like the beginning of a new era to the young creatures over whom the winter of gloom was naturally passing away. Susie and Alice were much disappointed by the cloud that came over Fred after the first joy of their greetings. Instead of sitting with them and telling them everything, he disappeared on the first evening, with a sort of impatient, almost angry, resistance of their blandishments. “Oh, let me alone; I have a thousand things to think of,” he said, pushing them away as the manner of big brothers is. Susie and Alice forgave Fred when they saw the little red tip of his cigar on the terrace, and realised that he had gone there “to think of father.” For a moment it was debated between them whether one of them should not go to him to share his solitude and thoughts; but they decided, with a better inspiration, to leave him alone, and even withdrew delicately from the drawing-room window, not to seem to spy upon his sacred thoughts. “Oh, do you mind how papa used to go up and down, up and down?” said Alice to Susie. “Do I mind?” said Susie, half indignant. “Could I ever forget?” And they shed a few tears together, then hurried off to the table in the full light of the lamps, where Fred’s curiosities which he had brought home, and all his little presents, were laid out for inspection, and began to laugh and twitter over them, and compare this with that, like two birds.