The day before the christening, Mr. Ferrars brought back Gilbert and his own little Willie. Through all the interchange of greetings, Gilbert would hardly let go Albinia’s hand, and the moment her attention was free, he earnestly whispered, ‘May I see my brother?’ She took him upstairs at once. ‘Let me look a little while,’ he said, hanging over the child with a sort of hungry fondness and curiosity. ‘My brother! my brother!’ he repeated. ‘It has rung in my ears every morning that I can say my brother once more, till I have feared it was a dream.’ It was the sympathy Albinia cared for, come back again! ‘I hope he will be a good brother to you,’ she said. ‘He must be good! he can’t help it! He has you!’ said Gilbert. ‘See, he is opening his eyes--oh! how blue! May I touch him?’ ‘To be sure you may. He is not sugar,’ said Albinia, laughing. ‘There--make an arm; you may have him if you like. Your left arm, you awkward man. Yes, that is right. You will do quite as well as I, who never touched a baby till Willie was born. There, sir, how do you like your brother Gilbert?’ Gilbert held him reverently, and gave him back with a sigh when he seemed to have satiated his gaze and touch, and convinced himself that his new possession was substantial. ‘I say,’ he added wistfully, ‘did you think _that_ name would bring ill-luck? She knew the name he meant, and answered, ‘No, but your father could not have borne it. Besides, Gibbie, we would not think him _instead_ of Edmund. No, he shall learn, to look up to his other brother as you do, and look to meeting and knowing him some day.’ Gilbert shivered at this, and made no opposition to her carrying him downstairs to his uncle, and then Gilbert hurried off for the basket of snowdrops that he had gathered early, from a favourite spot at Fairmead. That short absence seemed to have added double force to his affection; he could hardly bear to be away from her, and every moment when he could gain her ear, poured histories of the delights of Fairmead, where Mr. Ferrars had devoted himself to his amusement, and had made him happier than perhaps he had ever been in his life--he had had a taste of shooting, of skating, of snowballing--he had been useful and important in the village feasts, had dined twice at Colonel Bury’s, and felt himself many degrees nearer manhood. To hear of her old haunts and friends from such enthusiastic lips, delighted Albinia, and her felicity with her baby, with Mr. Kendal, with her brother and his little son, was one of the brightest things in all the world--the fresh young loving bloom of her matronhood was even sweeter and more beautiful than her girlish days.