"I don't know, dear sir," was her reply; "I can see plenty of the dross in myself, but yet I do hope and trust that the chastening has not been altogether in vain." "I will leave you now, Jane," said the vicar, rising, "and I shall be delighted to hear from your brother's own lips all about his finding the long-missing bag." CHAPTER NINETEEN. FULL SATISFACTION. On the afternoon of the next day after his disclosure of the good news to Jane Bradly, the vicar received a note from herself, asking the favour, if quite convenient, of the company of himself and his sister, Miss Maltby, at a simple tea at Thomas's house. Gladly complying with this request, the invited guests entered their host's hospitable kitchen at half-past six o'clock, and found just himself and his family, ready to greet them. "I'm glad to see you safe back again, Thomas," said Mr Maltby, as he took his seat by Mrs Bradly, Jane being on his other hand. "And right glad I am to find myself safe back again," said the other. "London's no place for me. I got my head so full of horses and carriages, and ladies and gentlemen, and houses of all sorts and sizes, that I could scarce get a wink of sleep last night; and as for that underground railway, why it's like as if all the world was running away from all the rest of the world, without waiting to say `good-bye.'" "And so you've found the bag at last?" said Miss Maltby. "If you please, ma'am," said Thomas, "I thought, with your leave, not meaning to be uncivil, and with the vicar's leave, we'd just let that matter be till tea's over, and then go right into it. None of us has looked inside the bag since I came back, not even Jane; she's been quite content to wait and take my word for it as all's right. I thought as I'd just tell my story in my own way, and then you'd all of you be able to see how wonderfully all has been ordered." "Nothing can be better than that, I'm sure; don't you think so, Ernest?" said Miss Maltby. "Yes," replied her brother; "it is a privilege to be thus invited to `rejoice with them that do rejoice,' as we have wept with you when you wept. So you shall tell us your story, Thomas, at your own time, for that will be the best.--And now let me know how you found Dr Prosser and his wife, and if all was right about poor Lydia Philips." Having replied to this question, and given due attention to the entertainment of his guests, Thomas Bradly, when tea was finished, helped his wife to remove the large table to one side, and then, having drawn forward a smaller one into the midst of the assembled company, placed on the very centre of it a bag, which he fetched out of his surgery. Certainly the article itself was not one much calculated to draw attention or excite curiosity; indeed, there was something almost burlesque in its extreme shabbiness, as it stood there the centre of attraction, or at any rate observation, to so many eyes.