ite
forehead, as she smiled at her daughter, laughing happily among her
cousins.

Mrs Jo shook her head as if the silver lining of that cloud was hard to
find; but she had no time to croak again, for just then Mr Laurie came
in looking well pleased at something.

'A new picture has arrived; face towards the music-room, good people,
and tell me how you like it. I call it "Only a fiddler", after
Andersen's story. What name will you give it?'

As he spoke he threw open the wide doors, and just beyond they saw a
young man standing, with a beaming face, and a violin in his hand. There
was no doubt about the name to this picture, and with the cry 'Nat!
Nat!' there was a general uprising. But Daisy reached him first, and
seemed to have lost her usual composure somewhere on the way, for she
clung to him, sobbing with the shock of a surprise and joy too great for
her to bear quietly. Everything was settled by that tearful and tender
embrace, for, though Mrs Meg speedily detached her daughter, it was only
to take her place; while Demi shook Nat's hand with brotherly warmth,
and Josie danced round them like Macbeth's three witches in one,
chanting in her most tragic tones:

'Chirper thou wast; second violin thou art; first thou shalt be. Hail,
all hail!'

This caused a laugh, and made things gay and comfortable at once. Then
the usual fire of questions and answers began, to be kept up briskly
while the boys admired Nat's blond beard and foreign clothes, the girls
his improved appearance--for he was ruddy with good English beef
and beer, and fresh with the sea-breezes which had blown him swiftly
home--and the older folk rejoiced over his prospects. Of course all
wanted to hear him play; and when tongues tired, he gladly did his best
for them, surprising the most critical by his progress in music even
more than by the energy and self-possession which made a new man
of bashful Nat. By and by when the violin--that most human of all
instruments--had sung to them the loveliest songs without words, he
said, looking about him at these old friends with what Mr Bhaer called a
'feeling-full' expression of happiness and content:

'Now let me play something that you will all remember though you won't
love it as I do'; and standing in the attitude which Ole Bull has
immortalized, he played the street melody he gave them the first night
he came to Plumfield. They remembered it, and joined in the plaintive
chorus, which fitly expressed hi