"Well," said Claude, "I have here every line and shade, and she cannot escape me. I'll go on board and paint her right off from memory, while it is fresh. Why, here come Scoutbush and the Major." "Miss Harvey," said Scoutbush, trying, as he said to Campbell, "to look as grand as a sheep-dog among a pack of fox-hounds, and very thankful all the while he had no tail to be bitten off"--"Miss Harvey, I--we-- have heard a great deal in praise of your school; and so I thought I should like to come and see it." "Would your lordship like to examine the children?" says Grace, curtseying to the ground. "No--thanks--that is--I have no doubt you teach them all that's right, and we are exceedingly gratified with the way in which you conduct the school.--I say Val," cried Scoutbush, who could support the part of patron no longer, "what pretty little ducks they are, I wish I had a dozen of them! Come you here!" and down he sat on a bench, and gathered a group round him. "Now, are you all good children? I'm sure you look so!" said he, looking round into the bright pure faces, fresh from Leaven, and feeling himself the nearer heaven as he did so. "Ah! I see Mr. Mellot's been drawing you pictures. He's a clever man, a wonderful man, isn't he? I can't draw you pictures, nor tell you stories, like your schoolmistress. What shall I do?" "Sing to them, Fred!" said Valencia. And he began warbling a funny song, with a child on each knee, and his arms round three or four more, while the little faces looked up into his, half awe-struck at the presence of a live lord, half longing to laugh, but not sure whether it would be right. Valencia and Campbell stood close together, exchanging looks. "Dear fellow!" whispered she, "so simple and good when he is himself! And he must go to that dreadful war!" "Never mind. Perhaps by this very act he is earning permission to come back again, a wiser and a more useful man." "How then?" "Is he not making friends with angels who always behold our Father's face? At least he is showing capabilities of good, which God gave; and which therefore God will never waste." "Now, shall I sing you another song?" "Oh yes, please!" rose from a dozen little mouths. "You must not be troublesome to his lordship," says Grace. "Oh no, I like it. I'll sing them one more song, and then--I want to speak to you, Miss Harvey." Grace curtsied, blushed, and shook all over. What could Lord Scoutbush want to say to her? That indeed was not very easy to discover at first; for Scoutbush felt so strongly the oddity of taking a pretty young woman into his counsel on a question of sanitary reform, that he felt mightily inclined to laugh, and began beating about the bush, in a sufficiently confused fashion. "Well, Miss Harvey, I am exceedingly pleased with--with what I have seen of the school--that is, what my sister tells, and the clergyman--"