t came a handkerchief,
which was applied to each eye in turn, and came away bedewed with tears.

"It will break my heart to part from her!" she faltered. Her husband
laughed with masculine scepticism.

"Oh, nonsense, dear," he said; "hearts are not so easily broken. You
are too sensible to grieve over what is for the child's good, and will
get used to the separation, as other mothers have done before you. It
will be the making of Rhoda to leave home for a few years, to mix with
other girls, and find her level. She is getting an altogether
exaggerated idea of her own importance!"

"Her level, indeed! Find her level! I should like to know the school
where you could find another girl like her!" cried the mother, in a tone
which showed plainly enough who was responsible for Miss Rhoda's
conceit. The tears dried on her face for very indignation, and she sat
upright in her seat, staring across the room.

It was a gorgeous apartment, this drawing-room of Erley Chase, the
residence of Henry Chester, Esquire, and Marianne his wife; a gorgeous
room in the literal acceptance of the term, for each separate article of
furniture looked as if it had been chosen more from the fact of its
intrinsic value than for its usefulness or beauty.

Mr Chester, the son of a country clergyman, had considered himself
passing rich when a manufacturer uncle took him into his employ, at a
salary of L400 a year. The first thing he did after this position was
assured was to marry his old love, the daughter of the village doctor,
with whom he had played since childhood; and the young couple spent the
first dozen years of their married lives very happily and contentedly in
a little house in a smoky manufacturing town. The bachelor uncle was
proud of his clever nephew and fond of the cheery little wife, who was
always kind and thoughtful even when gout and a naturally irritable
temper goaded him into conduct the reverse of amiable. When Harold was
born, and christened after himself, he presented the child with a silver
mug, and remarked that he hoped he would turn out better than most young
men, and not break his parents' hearts as a return for their goodness.
When Jim followed, the mug was not forthcoming; but when little Rhoda
made her appearance six years later he gave her a rattle, and trusted
that she would improve in looks as she grew older, since he never
remembered seeing an uglier baby. He was certainly neither a gracious
nor a lib