ng the snowy track; when the
fire blazes within, and lamps are lit up to welcome them home; and hope
and expectation and glad heart beatings are the lot of so many--of many,
not of all. Christmas was come, but it brought no hope, no gladness, no
mirth to poor White, either present or in prospect. The music and the
bells of Christmas, the skating, the pony riding, the racing, the brisk
walk, the home endearments were not for Joe--poor Joe. No mother longed
for his return, no brother or little sister pressed to the hall door to
get the first look or the first word; no father welcomed Joe back to the
hearth-warmth of home sweet home. Poor orphan boy!

Joe's uncle and aunt wrote him a kind letter, quite agreed in Mr.
Parker's opinion that a journey into Lincolnshire was, in the state of
his back and general health, out of the question, were fully satisfied
that he was under the best care, both medical and magisterial, (they had
never seen either doctor or master, and had only known of Mr. Barton
through an advertisement,) and sent him a handsome present of pocket
money, with the information that they were going to the South of France
for the winter. Joe bore the news of their departure very coolly, and
carelessly pocketed the money, knowing as he did that he had a handsome
property in his uncle's hands, and no one would have supposed from any
exhibition of feeling that he manifested, that he had any feeling or any
care about the matter. Once, indeed, when a fly came to the door to
convey Harcourt to the railway, and he saw from the window of his room
the happy school-boy jumping with glee into the vehicle, and heard him
say to Mr. Barton, "Oh yes, Sir, I shall be met!" he turned to Fred who
sate by him and said, "No one is expecting _me_, no one in the whole
world is thinking of me now, Parker."

Fred told his mother of this speech, a speech so full of bitter truth
that it made Mrs. Parker, kind creature as she was, shed tears, and she
asked her husband if young White could not be removed to pass the
Christmas holidays with them. The distance was not great, and they could
borrow Mr. Darford's carriage, and perhaps it might do him good. Mr.
Parker agreed, and the removal was effected.

For some days it seemed doubtful whether the change would be either for
poor White's mental happiness or bodily improvement. The exertion, and
the motion and excitement together, wrought powerfully on his nervous
frame, and he was more distr