my brothers yet resounding in the entrance-hall, or Caroline's light footstep on the stair while she carolled a song, or called me by name to execute some of the hundred and one errands perpetually invented by those who have a willing messenger always at hand. My occupations, however, were now rapidly increasing at home, as Lord Charles's sight had become greatly impaired, so that he could scarcely read, and it became my duty to enliven him with music and conversation, or to let him hear the letters of his absent children. The deep interest which he felt in their contents rendered the task a delightful one, and I used sometimes to amuse myself with thinking, if a shop could be opened in which the customers might buy letters from those they love, what a price would sometimes be given, and how extravagant on that point our kind father would have been.

It seemed still an established fact in the conviction of our friend, Lady Ashcourt, that I must be a heavy care on the hands of my father, while the distant prosperity of my absent sisters must, of course, be to him a subject of incessant enjoyment; therefore she pressed me constantly to visit her at the Abbey. In the estimation of Lady Ashcourt any person unmarried was only the half of a whole. She gloried in her own extraordinary skill as a matchmaker, and was evidently convinced

that the best way of rendering my father happy for life would be, if, through her instrumentality, I left it in a carriage-and-four, perhaps, like my sisters, never, or very seldom, to return.

But,' said I, in answer to her very kind entreaties, one day, that my visit to Ashcourt Abbey might be prolonged, which she accompanied by a dissertation on the eligibility of whatever match might first be offered, much as I like to come here, and to stay while you so kindly wish it, yet I have no wish altogether to leave my own happy home and my kindest of parents. If I am not of very great use to him, I.can at least pick up his spectacles when they fall.'

Lord Ashcourt was equally partial to me, and unwilling to let me go. With him I had become an established favorite, on account of my buoyant spirits, and keen delight in all his favorite old stories. He called me his receiver-general,' on account of the ready laugh with which I welcomed his jests; and many of his visitors were surprised that the aged peer, who was in general a man of proud and stately manner, should so frequently relax with me from the almost repulsive dignity of his habitual address.

I was myself astonished sometimes to find how, unchecked by the consciousness of Lord Ashcourt's age and rank, or of the awe and reverence which

he inspired in all others, I used to jest with him in these my juvenile days; but the certainty of his regard, and long experience of his kindness, gave me perfect confidence that with him and Lady Ashcourt I could neither say nor do wrong. There are persons of a jealous and suspicious temper, whose utmost experience of past kindness never leads them to trust implicity in the continued good intentions of their friends; but I felt assured that my own gratitude was not more permanently established than their regard. Lord Ashcourt seemed to consider it a personal injury one day when he found that I was discussing with Lady Ashcourt a project for my returning home. What do you want there?' he asked me in a tone of good-humored jocularity. 'Have you not beaux enough or amusements enough here? Why have you tired of us all so soon?'

Perhaps I am afraid of being too happy-of becoming quite spoiled for my own quiet little tête-à-tête home.'

'Then wait till you find a better home for yourself; and, to judge from appearances, that will not be very long.'

Lord Ashcourt contracted his features into a sly expression of comic humor, and placed his finger on his lips as an intimation that he would keep the secret, adding, in an under tone, I know of at

least one in this room who is dying for you to remain.'

'Then he must die! If I cannot stay to please you, no one else could have a chance.'

I smiled when his eye became directed to Sir Ernest Gordon, an unconscious object of Lady Ashcourt's manoeuvres for me, who stood at some distance preparing his flute to perform our usual duet. He had been very adroitly placed next me at dinner during several previous days, when we had kept up a laughing lively dialogue, without our having apparently a feeling or a sentiment in common, and we were about to part as we had met, I believed, with total indifference. To my kind old friend's little gossipping hint, therefore, I lent an inattentive ear, and left him to prepare for returning to the duties of home.

'Sweet Memory, wafted by thy gentle gale,
Oft up the stream of Time I turn my sail,
To view the fairy-haunts of long-lost hours,
Blest with far greener shades, far sweeter flowers.'

ROGERS.

CHAPTER XI.

"'Tis sweet to know there is an eye will mark

Our coming, and look brighter when we come.'

BYRON.

IF my honored father ever allowed himself to have a favorite in his family, it had always been myself, and there seemed no bounds now to his indulgent affection. He saw in me the happiest and most light-hearted being on the earth, who felt no care but to fulfil, or rather to anticipate, all his wishes, and he was amused as well as pleased, in bygone days, at my transports when first promoted from the school-room to that very small drawing-room, where hitherto it had always been one of my happiest privileges to spend an hour.

In spite of Lady Ashcourt's whispered remark, that it would be a great relief and comfort when I was finally disposed of, I still persisted in obstinately believing that I should be an actual loss at home, and an irreparable blank to my father. Often has

Ga