omplain of Miss MacDowlas. She was not
so bad as she looked, after all. She was obstinate and rigid enough
on some points, but she had her fairer side, and Dolly found it. In a
fashion of her own Miss MacDowlas was rather fond of her companion.
A girl who was shrewd, industrious, and often amusing, was not to be
despised in her opinion; so she showed her fair young handmaiden a
certain amount of respect. She had engaged companions before, who
being entertaining were not trustworthy, or being trustworthy were
insufferably dull. She could trust Dolly with the most onerous of her
domestic or social charges, she found, and there was no fear of her
small change disappearing or her visitors being bored. So the position
of that "young person" became an assured and decently comfortable one.

But, day by day, Griffith was drifting nearer and nearer the old shoals
of difficulty. He rasped himself with miserable imaginings, and was
often unjust even toward Dolly. Hers was the brighter side of the
matter, he told himself.

She was sure to find friends,--she always did, these people would make
a sort of favorite of her, and she would be pleased because she was
so popular among them. He could not bear the thought of her ephemeral
happiness over trifles sometimes. He even fell so low as that at
his worst moments, though to his credit, be it spoken, he was always
thoroughly ashamed of himself afterward. There were times, too, when
he half resented her little jokes at their poverty, and answered them
bitterly when he wrote his replies to her letters. His chief consolation
he found in Aimee, and the sage of the family found her hands fuller
than ever. Quiet little body as she was, she was far-sighted enough to
see danger in the distance, and surely she did her best to alter its
course.

"If you are not cooler," she would say, "you will work yourself into
such a fever of unhappiness, that you will be doing something you will
regret."

"That is what I am afraid of," he would sometimes burst forth; "but you
must admit, Aimee, that it is a pretty hard case."

"Yes," confessed the young oracle, "I will admit that, but being
unreasonable won't make it any easier."

And then the fine little lines would show themselves, and she would set
herself industriously to the task of administering comfort and practical
advice, and she never failed to cheer him a little, however temporarily.

And she did not fail Dolly, either. Sage axioms and prai