acters
who only really _love_ two or three people in the whole course of their
existence. To such, life is a serious, perilous, and often terrible
journey.

"Well, Tittens, I don't know, really, what we are to do with ourselves
this morning," said Agatha, talking aloud to her Familiar, the black
kitten, who shared the solitude of her little drawing-room. "You'd like
to go and play downstairs, I dare say? It's all very nice for you to be
running after Mrs. Ianson's wools, but I can't see anything amusing in
fancy-work. And as for dawdling round this square and Russell Square
with Jane Ianson and Fido--pah! I'd quite as soon be changed into a
lapdog, and led along by a string. How stupid London is! Oh, Tittens,
to think that you and I have never lived in the country since we were
born. Wouldn't you like to go? Only, then we should never see
anybody"----

The foolish girl paused, and laughed, as if she did not like to
soliloquise too confidentially, even to a kitten.

"Which of them did you like the best last night, Tittens? One was not
over civil to you; but Nathanael--yes, certainly you and that juvenile
are great friends, considering you have met but four evenings. All in
one week, too. Our house is getting quite gay, Miss Tittens; only it is
so much the duller in the mornings. Heigho!

"Life's a weary, weary, weary, Life's a weary coble o' care."

"What's the other verse? And she began humming:

"Man's a steerer, steerer, steerer, Man's a steerer--life is a pool."

"I wonder, Tittens, how you and I shall steer through it? and whether
the pool will be muddy or clear?"

Twisting her fingers in and about her pet's jetty for, Agatha sat
silent, until slowly there grew a thoughtful shadow in her eyes, a
forewarning of the gradual passing away of that childishness, which in
her, from accidental circumstances, had lasted strangely long.

"Come, we won't be foolish, Tittens," cried she, suddenly starting up.
"We'll put on our bonnets, and go out--that is, one of us will, and the
other may take to Berlin wool and Mrs. Ianson."

The bonnet was popped on quickly and independently--Miss Bowen scorned
to indulge in the convenience or annoyance of a lady's-maid. Crossing
the hall, the customary question, "Whether she would be home to dinner?"
stopped her.

"I don't know--I am not quite sure. Tell Mrs. Ianson not to wait for
me."

And she passed out, feeling keener than usual the consciousness that
nobody would wait f