wouldn't she be weel, and hearty too?" said the girl, who rather
felt the question as savoring of ingratitude, seeing what blessings of
fortune had been showered upon them.

As he walked hurriedly along, Jeanie trotted at his side, telling him,
in broken and disjointed sentences, the events of the place,--the joy of
the whole neighborhood on hearing of his new wealth; their hopes that
he might not leave that part of the country; what Mrs. Blackie of Craigs
Mills said at Mrs. Dumphy's christening, when she gave the name of Tony
to the baby, and wouldn't say Anthony; and how Dr. M'Candlish improved
the occasion for "twa good hours, wi' mair text o' Scripture than wad
make a Sabbath-day's discourse; and ech, Maister Tony, it's a glad heart
I'll hae o' it all, if I could only think that you 'll no be going to
keep a man creature,--a sort of a butler like; there 's no such wastefu'
bodies in the world as they, and wanting mair ceremonies than the best
gentleman in the land."

Before Tony had finished assuring her that no change in the household
should displace herself, they had reached the little wicket; his mother,
as she stood at the door, caught the sound of his voice, rushed out to
meet him, and was soon clasped in his arms.

"It's more happiness than I hoped for,--more, far more," was all she
could say, as she clung to him. Her next words were uttered in a cry of
joy, when the light fell full upon him in the doorway,--"you 're just
your father, Tony; it's your own father's self I see standing before me,
if you had not so much hair over your face."

"I 'll soon get rid of that, mother, if you dislike it."

"Let it be, Master Tony,--let it be," cried Jeanie; "though it
frightened me a bit at first, it 's no so bad when one gets used to it."

Though Mrs. Butler had determined to make Tony relate every event that
took place from the day he left her, in regular narrative order, nothing
could be less connected, nothing less consecutive, than the incidents he
recounted. Now it would be some reminiscence of his messenger
days,--of his meeting with that glorious Sir Joseph, who treated him so
handsomely; then of that villain who stole his despatches; of his
life as a rag-merchant, or his days with Garibaldi. Rory, too, was
remembered; and he related to his mother the pious fraud by which he had
transferred to his humble follower the promotion Garibaldi had bestowed
upon himself.

"He well deserved it, and more; he carrie