ble and silent, her father remained at his
dessert and wine, until he remembered it was time for him to get home to
Holloway. 'Though I positively cannot tear myself away,' he cherubically
added, '--it would be a sin--without drinking to many, many happy
returns of this most happy day.'

'Here! ten thousand times!' cried John. 'I fill my glass and my precious
wife's.'

'Gentlemen,' said the cherub, inaudibly addressing, in his Anglo-Saxon
tendency to throw his feelings into the form of a speech, the boys down
below, who were bidding against each other to put their heads in the mud
for sixpence: 'Gentlemen--and Bella and John--you will readily suppose
that it is not my intention to trouble you with many observations on the
present occasion. You will also at once infer the nature and even
the terms of the toast I am about to propose on the present occasion.
Gentlemen--and Bella and John--the present occasion is an occasion
fraught with feelings that I cannot trust myself to express. But
gentlemen--and Bella and John--for the part I have had in it, for the
confidence you have placed in me, and for the affectionate good-nature
and kindness with which you have determined not to find me in the way,
when I am well aware that I cannot be otherwise than in it more or less,
I do most heartily thank you. Gentlemen--and Bella and John--my love
to you, and may we meet, as on the present occasion, on many future
occasions; that is to say, gentlemen--and Bella and John--on many happy
returns of the present happy occasion.'

Having thus concluded his address, the amiable cherub embraced his
daughter, and took his flight to the steamboat which was to convey him
to London, and was then lying at the floating pier, doing its best to
bump the same to bits. But, the happy couple were not going to part with
him in that way, and before he had been on board two minutes, there they
were, looking down at him from the wharf above.

'Pa, dear!' cried Bella, beckoning him with her parasol to approach the
side, and bending gracefully to whisper.

'Yes, my darling.'

'Did I beat you much with that horrid little bonnet, Pa?'

'Nothing to speak of; my dear.'

'Did I pinch your legs, Pa?'

'Only nicely, my pet.'

'You are sure you quite forgive me, Pa? Please, Pa, please, forgive me
quite!' Half laughing at him and half crying to him, Bella besought him
in the prettiest manner; in a manner so engaging and so playful and
so natural, that her