ce. On the principle of doing everything to please him,
she was even encouraged to write to Charles in the packet in which
he was almost implored to recover, though all felt doubts whether he
were alive even while the letters were in hand, and this doubt
lasted long and long. It was all very well to say that as long as
the servant did not return his master must be safe--perhaps himself
on the way home; but the journey from Transylvania was so long, and
there were so many difficulties in the way of an Englishman, that
there was little security in this assurance. And so the winter set
in while the suspense lasted; and still Dr. Woodford spoke Charles's
name in the intercessions in the panelled household chapel, and his
mother and Anne prayed together and separately, and his little son
morning and evening entreated God to "Bless papa, and make him well,
and bring him home."

Thus passed more than six weeks, during which Sir Philip's attention
was somewhat diverted from domestic anxieties by an uninvited visit
to Portchester from Mr. Charnock, who had once been a college mate
of Mr. Fellowes, and came professing anxiety, after all these years,
to renew the friendship which had been broken when they took
different sides on the election of Dr. Hough to the Presidency of
Magdalen College. From his quarters at the Rectory Mr. Charnock had
gone over to Fareham, and sounded Sir Philip on the practicability
of a Jacobite rising, and whether he and his people would join it.
The old gentleman was much distressed, his age would not permit him
to exert himself in either cause, and he had been too much disturbed
by James's proceedings to feel desirous of his restoration, though
his loyal heart would not permit of his opposing it, and he had
never overtly acknowledged William of Orange as his sovereign.

He could only reply that in the present state of his family he
neither could nor would undertake anything, and he urgently pleaded
against any insurrection that could occasion a civil war.

There was reason to think that Sedley had no hesitation in promising
to use all his influence over his uncle's tenants, and considerably
magnifying their extremely small regard to him--nay, probably,
dwelling on his own expectations.

At any rate, even when Charnock was gone, Sedley continued to talk
big of the coming changes and his own distinguished part in them.
Indeed one very trying effect of the continued alarm about Charles
was that h