bays and
harbours, he occupied his time in cutting several teeth, in learning to
seize everything that came near him, and in finding out towards the end
of the time how to throw or drop his toys overboard. He was even
observed on a calm day to watch these waifs as they floated off, and was
confidently believed to recognise them as his own property, while in
such language as he knew, which was not syllabic, he talked and scolded
at them, as if, in spite of facts, he meant to charge them with being
down there entirely through their own perversity.

There is nothing so unreasonable as infancy, excepting the maturer
stages of life.

His parents thought all this deeply interesting. So did the old uncle,
who put down the name of St. George Mortimer Brandon for a large legacy,
and was treated by the legatee with such distinguishing preference as
seemed to suggest that he must know what he was about, and have an eye
already to his own interests.

Four months and a half. The Mortimers did not find them so long in
passing as in anticipation, and whether they were long or short to their
father and his new wife, they did not think of considering. Only a sense
of harmony and peace appeared to brood over the place, and they felt the
sweetness of it, though they never found out its name. There was more
freedom than of yore. Small persons taken with a sudden wish to go down
and see what father and mamma were about could do so; one would go
tapping about with a little crutch, another would curl himself up at the
end of the room, and never seem at all in the way. The new feminine
element had great fascinations for them, they made pictures for Emily,
and brought her flowers, liking to have a kiss in return, and to feel
the softness of her velvet-gown.

The taller young people, instead of their former tasteless array, wore
delightfully pretty frocks and hats, and had other charming decorations
chosen for them. They began to love the memory of their dead mother.
What could she not have been to them if she had lived, when only a
step-mother was so sweet and so dear and so kind? And mamma had said to
them long before she had thought of marrying father, that their mother
would have greatly wished them to please their father's wife, and love
her if they could. Nothing was so natural as to do both, but it was
nice, to be sure, that she would have approved.

It was not long after John Mortimer and his wife returned from their
very short wed