rs Hudson would paint bulrushes on cream-pots, and forget-me-nots on
tambourines, and come round bristling with importance. `I always find
fancy work is overdone at sales, so I thought a little of my hand-
painting would be acceptable! No one needs more than a dozen cosies,
but every one is glad of an extra tambourine!' ... It's easy to talk,
my dear, but what could you do when it came to the point? There's
nothing for it but to smile, and look pleased."

"I should say politely, but firmly, that I could not find it in my heart
to deprive them of such treasures--that with so many deserving objects
craving support, it would be pure selfishness on our part to monopolise
all the good things! Such munificence was far, far more than we
deserved, and would they kindly send a little cake instead? They would
be delighted, for they are everlastingly giving to some mission or
other, and are always in a rush to get work finished. But I don't
propose to let things reach such a climax. I wouldn't hurt their dear
old feelings for the world. So we will say at once that we want cake
and fruit, and we shall get the very best of its kind. We must fix our
date for the strawberry season; for the human heart is desperately
wicked, and people will gladly pay sixpence to sit under trees and eat
strawberries and cream, when wild horses wouldn't drag twopence out of
them for a pen-wiper. I expect we shall succeed best with punting and
refreshments."

"If it's fine! But it won't be fine--it will pour!" said Elsie
gloomily, and wagged her head in the hopeless manner of one who has
tasted deeply of the world, and knew its hollowness by heart. If there
was by chance a cheerful _and_ a melancholy view to be taken on any
subject, Elsie invariably chose the melancholy one, and gloated over it
with ghoulish enjoyment. She was never so happy as when she was
miserable,--as an Irishman would have had it,--and hugged the conviction
that she was "unappreciated" by her family, and a victim of fate. She
shed tears over _Misunderstood_ in the solitude of her chamber, and
cultivated an expression of patient martyrdom, as most fitted for her
condition. Occasionally she forgot herself so far as to be cheery and
playful; but her feelings were so ultrasensitive that they were bound to
be wounded by some thoughtlessness on the part of her sisters before
many hours were over, when she would remember her own unhappiness, and
roam away by herself to the