George if
occasion should require.

"How delighted you must have been to see your father!" said Miss
Baker, who, though her temper would not permit her to be uncivil to
Mr. M'Gabbery, would readily have dispensed with that gentleman's
attendance.

"Indeed, I was. I never saw him before, you know."

"Never saw him, your father, before, Mr. Bertram?" said Caroline.
"Why, aunt Mary says that I have seen him."

"I never saw him to remember him. One doesn't count one's
acquaintance before seven or eight years of age."

"Your memory must be very bad, then," said Mr. M'Gabbery, "or your
childhood's love for your father very slight. I perfectly remember
the sweetness of my mother's caresses when I was but three years
old. There is nothing, Miss Waddington, to equal the sweetness of a
mother's kisses."

"I never knew them," said she. "But I have found an aunt's do nearly
as well."

"A grandmother's are not bad," said Bertram, looking very grave.

"I can never think of my mother without emotion," continued Mr.
M'Gabbery. "I remember, as though it were yesterday, when I first
stood at her knee, with a picture-book on her lap before me. It is
the furthest point to which memory carries me--and the sweetest."

"I can remember back much before that," said George; "a great deal
before that. Listen to this, Miss Baker. My earliest impression was a
hatred of dishonesty."

"I hope your views have not altered since," said Caroline.

"Very materially, I fear. But I must tell you about my memory. I was
lying once in my cradle--"

"You don't mean to tell me you remember that?" said M'Gabbery.

"Perfectly, as you do the picture-book. Well, there I was lying, Miss
Baker, with my little eyes wide open. It is astonishing how much
babies see, though people never calculate on their having eyes at
all. I was lying on my back, staring at the mantelpiece, on which my
mother had left her key-basket."

"You remember, of course, that it was her key-basket?" said Miss
Waddington, with a smile that made M'Gabbery clench his walking-stick
in his hand.

"Perfectly; because she always kept her halfpence there also. Well,
there was a nursery-girl who used to be about me in those days. I
distinctly saw her go to that basket, Miss Baker, and take out a
penny; and I then made up my mind that the first use I would make of
my coming speech should be to tell my mother. That, I think, is the
furthest point to which my memory carries me."

The l