u sigh?"

"Sigh!" she said starting a little and colouring. "No,--I didn't mean
to sigh."

"The fact is more than the intention. Whence came that?"

"It was only--Please don't ask me, Mr. Linden. I can't tell you."

He made no answer to that, but turning over the leaves read to her here
and there without much comment,--then asked her if she was tired of
hearing about angels.

"I think I should never be tired!" said Faith. "But you must be, Mr.
Linden. Please," she said putting her hand gently on the book,--"don't
read for me any more. Is all the book like that?"

"Not quite all--I have given you some bits that I particularly like,
but there is much more. You need not be uneasy about my being tired,"
he said smiling; "if I were, by your own shewing I can have rest.
However, Miss Faith--lessons being the order of the day--will you read
French to me?"

In her reading, Faith came to the description of the philosopher's
perplexity in finding that the birds would not pick up the crumbs he
threw to them on the roof as usual. He concluded the feathered things
were not more reason able than mankind, and had taken fright for
nothing.

"J'allais fermer ma fenetre sur cette reflexion, quand j'apercois tout
a coup, dans l'espace lumineux qui s'etend a droite, l'ombre de deux
oreilles qui se dressent, puis une griffe qui s'avance, puis la tete
d'un chat tigre qui se montre a l'angle de la gouttiere. Le drole etait
la en embuscade, esperant que les aniettes lui ameneraient du gibier.

"Et moi qui accusais la couardise de mes hotes! J'etais sur qu'aucun
danger ne les menacait! je croyais avoir bien regarde partout! je
n'avais oublie que le coin derriere moi!

"Dans la vie comme sur les toits, que de malheurs arrivent pour avoir
oublie un seul coin!"

Faith closed the book then, very much amused with the philosopher's
"chat tigre."

"But often one can't see round the corner," she remarked.

A little gesture of lips and brow, half asserted that if one could not,
_one_ could: but Mr. Linden only said,

"Most true! Miss Faith. Nevertheless, the knowledge that there _are_
corners is not to be despised."

"I don't know. I shouldn't like to live always in fear of seeing the
shadow of a cat's ears come in."

"Have you quite outgrown the love of cats?" said Mr. Linden smiling.

"No, but I was talking of the fear of corners," she said with an
answering smile. "I don't think I want to remember the corners, Mr.
Linde