call on the Melvilles, poor things; but no one was in a hurry to
perform so disagreeable a duty. Mrs. Dalzell was so astounded by the
change that was made in her son's prospects, and so embarrassed lest
she should be looked to for assistance in the present urgent
necessities of the girls, that though she had been by far the most
intimate and cordial of their friends, she was not the first to visit
them. Three or four matrons had come and gone, who had made but short
calls, and who had taken refuge in commonplace inquiries as to how and
when Mr. Hogarth had been first taken ill, and at what hour he died,
but had given very little sympathy, and no advice. The minister of the
parish had called, as in duty bound, on the day after the funeral, and
surprised both Jane and Elsie by a style of conversation very different
from any they had ever heard from his lips. In his previous visits to
Cross Hall he had never talked of anything but the weather, and crops,
and the news of the neighbourhood. His tastes, his studies, his
politics, and his faith were so opposite to those of Mr. Hogarth that
there was no safety, and likely to be no pleasure, in conversation that
left the neutral ground he took. But now, when the eccentric and
sceptical Mr. Hogarth had crowned all this sins by an act of such
injustice to his nieces, and they were in affliction from bereavement
and poverty, he wished to give them spiritual comfort, and to teach
them something that he knew had been omitted in their education; but he
couched his consolation in language that seemed strangely unfamiliar to
the girls he addressed, and when he spoke of crosses to be borne, that
God has made crooks in every lot that no man may make straight--when he
dwelt upon the temptations of riches, and the difficulty with which the
rich can enter the kingdom of Heaven, and hoped that his young friends
would see the hand of God in this trying dispensation, and would follow
humbly His leading--Jane, who hoped to conquer her difficulties, and
did not mean to succumb to them, did not feel much comforted or edified
by the well-meant exhortation. Both girls felt pained, too, by the
reflections he cast on their late uncle, and by the warning to be
prepared for sudden death, as this had been an instance of the Master
coming when no one was looking for Him, and when the loins were not
girt, nor the light burning. Both girls had loved their uncle; and even
though Elsie felt that he had been of