elm-tree on the
other, it was as good as dining out-of-doors.

The boys were still gathered round Lady Caroline, in the little closet
off the dining-room where lessons were learnt; Muriel sat as usual on
the door-sill, petting one of her doves that used to come and perch on
her head and her shoulder, of their own accord, when I heard the child
say to herself:

"Father's coming."

"Where, darling?"

"Up the farm-yard way. There--he is on the gravel-walk. He has
stopped; I dare say it is to pull some of the jessamine that grows over
the well. Now, fly away, dove! Father's here."

And the next minute a general shout echoed, "Father's here!"

He stood in the doorway, lifting one after the other up in his arms;
having a kiss and a merry word for all--this good father!

O solemn name, which Deity Himself claims and owns! Happy these
children, who in its fullest sense could understand the word "father!"
to whom, from the dawn of their little lives, their father was what all
fathers should be--the truest representative here on earth of that
Father in heaven, who is at once justice, wisdom, and perfect love.

Happy, too--most blessed among women--the woman who gave her children
such a father!

Ursula came--for his eye was wandering in search of her--and received
the embrace, without which he never left her, or returned.

"All rightly settled, John?"

"Quite settled."

"I am so glad." With a second kiss, not often bestowed in public, as
congratulation. He was going to tell more, when Ursula said, rather
hesitatingly, "We have a visitor to-day."

Lady Caroline came out of her corner, laughing. "You did not expect
me, I see. Am I welcome?"

"Any welcome that Mrs. Halifax has given is also mine."

But John's manner, though polite, was somewhat constrained; and he
felt, as it seemed to my observant eye, more surprise than
gratification in this incursion on his quiet home. Also I noticed that
when Lady Caroline, in the height of her condescension, would have
Muriel close to her at dinner, he involuntarily drew his little
daughter to her accustomed place beside himself,

"She always sits here, thank you."

The table-talk was chiefly between the lady and her host; she rarely
talked to women when a man was to be had. Conversation veered between
the Emperor Napoleon and Lord Wellington, Lord William Bentinck and
Sardinian policy, the conjugal squabbles of Carlton House, and the
one-absorbing political ques