ked her how she liked Birmingham. He had seen her often
since the time when he first met her at the commencement of the strike,
as he had helped them in their preparations for removing from
Stokebridge, and had entirely got over the embarrassment which he had
felt on the first evening spent there.

After talking for a few minutes, Jack said gravely to Mr. Merton, "I
hope that these clothes will do, Mr. Merton?"

"Excellently well, Jack," he answered smiling; "they have made just the
difference I expected; my daughter hardly knew you when you rang at the
bell."

"I hardly knew myself when I saw myself in a glass," Jack said. "Now, on
what principle do you explain the fact that a slight alteration in the
cutting and sewing together of pieces of cloth should make such a
difference?"

"I do not know that I ever gave the philosophy of the question a
moment's thought, Jack," said Mr. Merton smiling. "I can only explain it
by the remark that the better cut clothes set off the natural curve of
the neck, shoulders, and figure generally, and in the second place,
being associated in our minds with the peculiar garb worn by gentlemen,
they give what, for want of a better word, I may call style. A high
black hat is the ugliest, most shapeless, and most unnatural article
ever invented, but still a high hat, good and of the shape in vogue,
certainly has a more gentlemanly effect, to use a word I hate, than any
other. And now, my boy, you I know dined early, so did we. We shall have
tea at seven, so we have three hours for work, and there are nearly six
weeks' arrears, so do not let us waste any more time."

After this first visit Jack went out regularly once every four weeks. He
fell very naturally into the ways of the house, and although his manner
often amused Alice Merton greatly, and caused even her father to smile,
he was never awkward or boorish.

As Alice came to know him more thoroughly, and their conversations
ceased to be of a formal character, she surprised and sometimes quite
puzzled him. The girl was full of fun and had a keen sense of humour,
and her playful attacks upon his earnestness, her light way of parrying
the problems which Jack, ever on the alert for information, was
constantly putting, and the cheerful tone which her talk imparted to the
general conversation when she was present, were all wholly new to the
lad. Often he did not know whether she was in earnest or not, and was
sometimes so overwhelmed by h