for the sake of charity,--for the dear love of Christ, that I
ask you to do it. Do you ever think of Mary Magdalene?"

"Oh yes."

"This is no Magdalene. This is a woman led into no faults by vicious
propensities. Here is one who has been altogether unfortunate,--who has
been treated more cruelly than any of whom you have ever read."

"Why did she not leave him?"

"Because she was a woman, with a heart in her bosom."

"I am to go to her?"

"I do not order it. I only ask it." Such asking from her husband was,
she knew, very near alike to ordering.

"What shall I say to her?"

"Bid her keep up her courage till he shall return. If you were all alone,
as she is, would not you wish that some other woman should come to comfort
you? Think of her desolation."

Mrs. Wortle did think of it, and after a day or two made up her mind to
obey her husband's--request. She made her call, but very little came of
it, except that she promised to come again. "Mrs. Wortle," said the poor
woman, "pray do not let me be a trouble to you. If you stay away I shall
quite understand that there is sufficient reason. I know how good your
husband has been to us." Mrs. Wortle said, however, as she took her
leave, that she would come again in a day or two.

But there were other troubles in store for Mrs. Wortle. Before she had
repeated her visit to Mrs. Peacocke, a lady, who lived about ten miles
off, the wife of the Rector of Buttercup, called upon her. This was the
Lady Margaret Momson, a daughter of the Earl of Brigstock, who had, thirty
years ago, married a young clergyman. Nevertheless, up to the present
day, she was quite as much the Earl's daughter as the parson's wife. She
was first cousin to that Mrs. Stantiloup between whom and the Doctor
internecine war was always being waged; and she was also aunt to a boy at
the school, who, however, was in no way related to Mrs. Stantiloup, young
Momson being the son of the parson's eldest brother. Lady Margaret had
never absolutely and openly taken the part of Mrs. Stantiloup. Had she
done so, a visit even of ceremony would have been impossible. But she was
supposed to have Stantiloup proclivities, and was not, therefore, much
liked at Bowick. There had been a question indeed whether young Momson
should be received at the school,--because of the _quasi_ connection with
the arch-enemy; but Squire Momson of Buttercup, the boy's father, had set
that at rest by bursting out, in t