ot and Gertie to
follow her, and was finally hurried with them into a first-class
carriage just as the train began to move.

Their only other companion in the carriage was a stout little old
gentleman with a bright complexion, speaking eyes, and a countenance in
which benevolence appeared to struggle with enthusiasm for the mastery.
He was obviously one of those men who delight in conversation, and he
quickly took an opportunity of engaging in it. Observing that Mrs
Tipps presented an insurance ticket to each of her companions, he said--

"I am glad to see, madam, that you are so prudent as to insure the lives
of your friends."

"I always insure my own life," replied Mrs Tipps with a little smile,
"and feel it incumbent on me at least to advise my friends to do the
same."

"Quite right, quite right, madam," replied the enthusiastic little man,
applying his handkerchief to his bald pate with such energy that it
shone like a billiard ball, "quite right, madam. I only wish that the
public at large were equally alive to the great value of insurance
against accident. W'y, ma'am, it's a duty, a positive duty," (here he
addressed himself to Mrs Marrot) "to insure one's life against
accident."

"Oh la! sir, is it?" said Mrs Marrot, quite earnestly.

"Yes, it is. Why, look here--this is your child?"

He laid his hand gently on Gertie's head.

"Yes, sir, she is."

"Well, my good woman, suppose that you are a widow and are killed,"
(Mrs Marrot looked as if she would rather not suppose anything of the
sort), "what I ask, what becomes of your child?--Left a beggar; an
absolute beggar!"

He looked quite triumphantly at Mrs Tipps and her companions, and
waited a few seconds as if to allow the idea to exert its full force on
them.

"But, sir," observed Mrs Marrot meekly, "supposin' that there do be an
accident," (she shivered a little), "that ticket won't prevent me bein'
killed, you know?"

"No, ma'am, no; but it will prevent your sweet daughter from being left
a beggar--that is, on the supposition that you are a widow."

"W'ich I ain't sir, I'm happy to say," remarked Mrs Marrot; "but, sir,
supposin' we was both of us killed--"

She paused abruptly as if she had committed a sin in merely giving
utterance to the idea.

"Why, then, your other children would get the 500 pounds--or your heirs,
whoever they may be. It's a splendid system that, of insurance against
accident. Just look at _me_, now." He spread ou