one might see how deeply agitated she had been, and when Martha got up at the usual hour asked for a cup of tea to restore her a little. “I have not been feeling quite well,” said Miss Susan, to anticipate any remarks as to her wan looks. “So I was afraid, miss,” said Martha, “but I thought as you’d call me if you wanted anything.” This lukewarm devotion made Miss Susan smile. Notwithstanding all her sufferings, however, she wrote a letter to Mr. Farrel-Austin that morning, and sent it by a private messenger, enclosing her telegram, so undeniably genuine, with a few accompanying words. “I am afraid you will not be exhilarated by this intelligence,” she wrote, “though I confess for my part it gives me pleasure, as continuing the family in the old stock. But anyhow, I feel it is my duty to forward it to you. It is curious to think,” she added, “that but for your kind researches, I might never have found out these Austins of Bruges.” This letter Miss Susan sealed with her big Whiteladies seal, and enclosed the telegram in a large envelope. And she went about all her ordinary occupations that day, and looked and even felt very much as usual. “I had rather a disturbed night, and could not sleep,” she said by way of explanation of the look of exhaustion she was conscious of. And she wrote to old Guillaume Austin of Bruges a very kind and friendly letter, congratulating him, and hoping that, if she had the misfortune to lose her nephew (who, however, she was very happy to tell him, was much better), his little grandson might long and worthily fill the place of master of Whiteladies. It was a letter which old Guillaume translated with infinite care and some use of the dictionary, not only to his family, but also to his principal customers, astonishing them by the news of his good fortune. To be sure his poor Gertrude, his daughter, was mourning the loss of her baby, born on the same day as his daughter-in-law’s fine boy, but which had not survived its birth. She was very sad about it, poor child; but still that was a sorrow which would glide imperceptibly away, while this great joy and pride and honor would remain.