My father’s death naturally made an important change in my mother’s plans for the future. The Château d’Hondt was given up, adieus were said, not without many _au revoirs_, to many kind friends at Bruges, and more especially at Ostend, and we left Belgium for England. After some time spent in house-hunting, my mother hired a pleasant house with a good garden on the common at Hadley, near Barnet, and there I remained with her, still awaiting my Birmingham preferment, all that winter and the following spring. The earlier part of the time was saddened by the rapid decline and death of my younger sister, Emily. We knew before leaving Bruges that there was but a slender hope of saving her from the same malady which had been fatal to my brother Henry. But the medical men hoped or professed to hope, that much might be expected from her return to her native air. But the mark of the cruel disease was upon her, and very rapidly after our establishment at Hadley she sank and painlessly breathed her last. Poor little Emily! She was a very bright _espiègle_ child, full of fun and high spirits. There is a picture of her exactly as I remember her. She is represented with flowing flaxen curls and wide china-blue eyes, sitting with a brown holland pinafore on before a writing-desk and blowing a prismatically-coloured soap-bubble. The writing copy on the desk lying above the half-covered and neglected page of copy-book bears the legend “Study with determined zeal!” Her youngest child had ever been to my mother as the apple of her eye, and her loss was for the passing day a crushing blow. But, as usual with her, her mind refused to remain crushed, any more than the grass is permanently crushed by the storm wind that blows over it. She had the innate faculty and tendency to throw sorrow off when the cause of it had passed. She owed herself to the living, and refused to allow unavailing regret for those who had been taken from her to incapacitate her for paying that debt to the utmost. And once again, as was usual with her, her new home became a centre of social enjoyment and attraction for all, especially the young, who were admitted to it. I do not remember that with the exception of the family of the rector, Mr. Thackeray, we had many acquaintances at Hadley. I remember a bit of fun, long current among us, which was furnished by the reception my mother met with when returning the call of the wife of a wealthy distiller resident in the neighbourhood. The lady was of abnormal bulk, and when my mother entered the room in which she was sitting, she said, “Excuse me, ma’am, if I keep my chair, I never _raise_. But I am glad to see you--glad to see anybody,” with much emphasis on the last word. I wish every caller was received with as truthful an expression of sentiments.