d
to make you and the girls happy. You will soon like this little
cottage; and when we get some more furniture, and some flowers, and a
bird in the window, it will look so bright and cheerful and--there,
there, pray don't cry. I must go; it only wants five minutes to nine,
and I must not be late the first morning."

"I think it disgraceful that, in addition to six days a week, you should
be compelled to go and teach on Sundays as well; and I shall make a
point of speaking to Mr Lambent the first time he calls--that is, if he
should ever condescend to call."

"No, no, pray don't think of such a thing, dear," cried Hazel Thorne
excitedly. "You forget that I have the whole of Saturday, and--there,
there--dear, dear mother, I must go. Good--good-bye."

Hazel Thorne kissed the stiff stately-looking lady in the stiffest of
widow's weeds, and with a bright look and a cheery nod, she hurried out
of the little Gothic schoolhouse, with its prim, narrow lancet windows;
but as she closed the door, the bright look gave place to one of anxious
care, and there was a troubled nervous twitching about her lips that
told of a struggle to master some painful emotion.

She had but a few yards to go, for the new school-buildings at Plumton
All Saints were in one tolerably attractive architectural group, built
upon a piece of land given two years before by Mr William Forth Burge,
a gentleman who had left Plumton All Saints thirty--but it should be
given in his own words, as he made a point of repeating them to every
new-comer:

"Yes, sir; I left Plumton thirty year ago, after being two year with old
Marks the butcher, and went up to London to seek my fortune, and I think
I found it, I did."

Mr William Forth Burge's fortune was made by being a butcher's boy for
some years, and then starting among some new houses near Chelsea on his
own account. Fashion and the speculative builders did the rest. Mr
William Forth Burge's business grew to a tremendous extent, and at
forty-five he sold it and proudly returned to his native place--a
gentleman, he said. Stout, red-faced, very pomatumy about his smooth,
plastered-down dark hair, very much dressed in glossy broadcloth and
white waistcoats, and very much scented with his favourite perfume,
"mill flowers," as he called it.

Mr William Forth Burge left Plumton--"Bill"; he came back writing his
name in full, and everybody followed his example as soon as he had shown
himself at the various