dy. You are such--'

'My goodness, Tom!' his sister interposed. 'You ought to fall in love
immediately.'

Tom put this observation off good humouredly, but somewhat gravely too;
and they were soon very chatty again on some other subject.

As they were passing through a street in the City, not very far from Mrs
Todgers's place of residence, Ruth checked Tom before the window of
a large Upholstery and Furniture Warehouse, to call his attention to
something very magnificent and ingenious, displayed there to the best
advantage, for the admiration and temptation of the public. Tom had
hazarded some most erroneous and extravagantly wrong guess in relation
to the price of this article, and had joined his sister in laughing
heartily at his mistake, when he pressed her arm in his, and pointed to
two persons at a little distance, who were looking in at the same window
with a deep interest in the chests of drawers and tables.

'Hush!' Tom whispered. 'Miss Pecksniff, and the young gentleman to whom
she is going to be married.'

'Why does he look as if he was going to be buried, Tom?' inquired his
little sister.

'Why, he is naturally a dismal young gentleman, I believe,' said Tom
'but he is very civil and inoffensive.'

'I suppose they are furnishing their house,' whispered Ruth.

'Yes, I suppose they are,' replied Tom. 'We had better avoid speaking to
them.'

They could not very well avoid looking at them, however, especially
as some obstruction on the pavement, at a little distance, happened to
detain them where they were for a few moments. Miss Pecksniff had quite
the air of having taken the unhappy Moddle captive, and brought him
up to the contemplation of the furniture like a lamb to the altar.
He offered no resistance, but was perfectly resigned and quiet. The
melancholy depicted in the turn of his languishing head, and in his
dejected attitude, was extreme; and though there was a full-sized
four-post bedstead in the window, such a tear stood trembling in his eye
as seemed to blot it out.

'Augustus, my love,' said Miss Pecksniff, 'ask the price of the eight
rosewood chairs, and the loo table.'

'Perhaps they are ordered already,' said Augustus. 'Perhaps they are
Another's.'

'They can make more like them, if they are,' rejoined Miss Pecksniff.

'No, no, they can't,' said Moddle. 'It's impossible!'

He appeared, for the moment, to be quite overwhelmed and stupefied by
the prospect of his approaching happines