over
the new version of his history, which Mr. Windgraff, for the sake of
displaying his acumen, stoutly declared to be spurious. Gretchen also
was served with a monstrous slice; and then the company bade good-bye to
the aunt and nephew, who began anew their glad recognition.

It was a noisy set of people who left Miss Pix's house. That little lady
stood in the doorway, and sent off each with such a merry blessing that
it lasted long after the doors of the other houses were closed. Even the
forlorn Mrs. Starkey seemed to go back almost as happy as when she had
issued forth in the evening with her newly found nephew. The sudden
gleam of hope which his unlooked-for coming had let in upon a toilsome
and thankless life--for we know more about her position in Mr. Manlius's
household than we have been at liberty to disclose--had, indeed, gone
out in darkness; but the Christmas merriment, and the kindness which for
one evening had flowed around her, had so fertilized one little spot in
her life, that, however dreary her pilgrimage, nothing could destroy the
bright oasis. It gave hope of others, too, no less verdant; and with
this hope uppermost in her confused brain the lonely widow entered the
land of Christmas dreams. Let us hope, too, that the pachydermatous Mr.
Manlius felt the puncture of her disappointment, and that Miss Pix's
genial warmth had made him cast off a little the cloak of selfishness in
which he had wrapped himself; for what else could have made him say to
his echoing wife that night, "Caroline, suppose we let Eunice take the
children to the panorama to-morrow. It's a quarter more; but she was
rather disappointed about that young fellow"? The learned Doctor
Chocker, who had, in all his days, never found a place to compare with
his crowded study for satisfaction to his soul, for the first time now,
as he entered it, admitted to himself that Miss Pix's arbor-like parlor
and Mrs. Blake's simple room had something that his lacked; and in the
frozen little bedroom where he nightly shivered, in rigid obedience to
some fancied laws of health, the old man was aware of some kindly
influence thawing away the chill frost-work which he had suffered to
sheathe his heart. Nor did Mr. Le Clear toast his slippered feet before
his cheery fire without an uncomfortable misgiving that his philosophy
hardly compassed the sphere of life.

Christmas-eve in the court was over. Strange things had happened; and,
for one night at lea