stence of which mood indicated genius. What poor
Ernie's father might have been I could only surmise from his own
qualities, which, after all, may have flowed from a far-off source; but
that his mother had been gentle, simple, and inefficient, I knew full
well, from my slight acquaintance with her, and observation of her
non-resisting organization. Ernie, on the contrary, grappled with
obstacles uncomplainingly, and was only outspoken in his moments of
gratification. His was the temperament that is the noblest and the most
magnanimous in its very moulding. Whining children are selfish, as a
rule, and petty-minded, and most often incapable of enjoyment--which
last is a gift of itself that goes not always with possession.

Among other accomplishments self-acquired, Ernie had the power of
mimicry to a singular degree. Mrs. Clayton had a slight hitch in her
gait of late from rheumatic suffering, which he simulated solemnly,
notwithstanding every effort on my part to restrain him.

Without a smile or any effort of mirth, he would limp behind as she
walked across the floor, unconscious of his close attendance, and when
she would turn suddenly and detect him, and shake her clinched fist at
him, half in jest, he would retaliate by a similar gesture, and scowl,
and stamp of the foot, that so nearly resembled her own proceedings as
to cause me much internal merriment. But of course for his own
advantage, as well as from regard for her feelings, it was necessary for
me on such occasions to assume a gravity of deportment bordering on
displeasure.

It may be supposed, then, that when, on the morning after Dr.
Englehart's visit, before my chamber had been swept and garnished, and
while Mrs. Clayton was busy in her own, Ernie brought me a letter and
laid it on the table before me, as Dr. Englehart had done the night
before in his presence, I was infinitely amused.

What, then, was my surprise in stooping over it to find this letter
addressed to myself in the unfamiliar yet never-to-be-forgotten
character of Wardour Wentworth!

After the first moment of bewilderment I opened the already-fastened
letter--closed, as was the fashion of the day, without envelope, and
sealed originally with wax, of which a few fragments still remained
alone.

The date, the subject, the earnest contents, convinced me that I now
held the clew of that mystery which had baffled me so long, and that the
missing letter said to have been lost at Le Noir's L