erself was one of the number, heaved a sigh--
perhaps for Helen, perhaps for herself, and for one whose very name was
now forgotten; who had gone down to the bottom of Loch Beg when the
Earl's father was drowned, and never afterward been seen, living or
dead, by any mortal eye.

The earl gave no answer to his good nurse's gossip. He contented
himself with making all arrangements for poor Helen's comfort, and
taking care that she should be supplied with every luxury befitting not
alone Captain Bruce's wife and Mr. Cardross's daughter, but the "cousin"
of the Earl of Cairnforth. And now, whenever he spoke of her, it was
invariably and punctiliously as "my cousin."

The baby too--Mrs. Campbell's truly feminine soul was exalted to
infinte delight and pride at being employed by the earl to procure the
most magnificent stock of baby clothes that Edinburg could supply. No
young heir to a peerage could be appareled more splendidly than was,
within a few days, Helen's boy. He was the admiration of the whole
hotel; and when his mother made some weak resistance, she received a
gentle message to the effect that the Earl of Cairnforth begged, as a
special favor, to be allowed to do exactly as he liked with his little
"cousin".

And every morning, punctual to the hour, the earl had himself taken up
stairs into the infantile kingdom of which Mrs. Campbell was installed
once more as head nurse, where he would sit watching with an amused
curiosity, that was not without its pathos, the little creature so
lately come into the world--to him, unfamiliar with babies, such a
wondrous mystery. Alas! A mystery which it was his lot to behold--as
all the joys of life--from the outside.

But, though life's joys were forbidden him, its duties seemed to
accumulate daily. There was Mr. Cardross to be kept patient by the
assurance that all was well, and that presently his daughter and his
grandchild would be coming home. There was Alick Cardross, now a young
clerk in the office of Menteith & Ross, to be looked after, and kept
from agitating his sister by any questionings; and there was a tribe of
young Menteiths always needing assistance or advice--now and then
something more tangible than advice. Then there were the earl's
Edinburg friends, who thronged round him in hearty welcome as soon as
ever they heard he was again in the good old city, and would willingly
have drawn him back again into that brilliant society which he had
enjoyed so