stammered out. • Without health, for instance; poor Mr. Aird-and indeed little Davey alsois a case in point.'

That doesn't militate against his being a good match,' insisted Mrs. Armytage; indeed, quite the contrary.'

6

'What sentiments!' exclaimed Anastasia. 'Yes; it's very fine,' snapped Mrs. Armytage, with the quickness and fire of a lucifer match -and by no means one of those that can only light upon its own box'-' but all of us are not all poetry and romance like you, Miss Jennynge; it's wonderful to me-though very creditable to yourself that you should have retained your simplicity so long.'

'Well,' said Mrs. Wallace, gently, in the pause that followed this onslaught—which, to say truth (in conjunction with her tight lacing and the prawns), had taken all the breath out of poor Anastasia, for my part, the longer I live the more I like simplicity.

'Ah, but you've no girls to marry!' rejoined Mrs. Armytage, tartly.

'That's true,' sighed Mrs. Wallace; her

thoughts at once transporting her far from the present scene to a distant grave.

'Indeed,' said Mrs. Percival Lott, taking courage from the number of her allies to cast her stone at the common enemy, 'I don't see why you should take such mercenary views of your own sex, Mrs. Armytage.'

'Of course not, because you've caught a husband,' was the swift rejoinder; if you were upon your promotion you would probably be looking after the loaves and fishes like any other young woman.'

The suspected bride turned scarlet; nor was her confusion mitigated by the circumstance that her husband, tickled, perhaps, by some reminiscences of his courting days, broke out into a little chuckle.

'Upon my word,' said Mr. Josceline, smiling, 'I shall rise and fly, Mrs. Armytage, for fear it may be the time for the males to come next under your castigation.'

6

'No, no; I have not a word to say against them,' returned the lady addressed; they are naturally simple, and therefore one never finds

them making a pretence of being so.

For my

part, I don't believe in a designing man.'

'You are wrong, there, madam-or rather as far from right as it is possible you can be,' said Mr. Josceline, politely. Do you think the Professor, for instance, has never been designing?'

6

Eh, what?' exclaimed that learned man, looking up from a brown study of the deepest tint, and seeing Mr. Josceline with his hand upon his half-pint of sherry; ' no, I thank you, not at this time of day.'

'Very likely,' laughed Mr. Josceline, rising from his chair; but a little earlier, perhaps, it was different.'

And in the general peal of laughter evoked by the Professor's mistake Mr. Josceline escaped from the room with considerable self-congratulation. If Mrs. Armytage's suspicions were aroused in one direction respecting him, it was clear that they were cast asleep in another.

Meanwhile Ella is wandering by the seashore, far from the hotel (and lunch), with little Davey's hand fast clasped in hers; their eyes

are fixed on the lessening sand-for the tide is rising-with eager intentness, and every piece of tangled weed and sea-worn rock is being examined by them as for lost treasure.

She had found the little fellow in tears just leaving the hotel, to which he had come back from his usual morning walk only a few minutes, and in reply to her compassionate inquiry had told her his pitiful story.

'Poor papa has met with a great misfortune, Miss Josceline,' he had sobbed out.

'Good heavens! But let us send him help,' cried Ella, at once imagining that he had been cut off in some bay by the sea, or had fallen over a cliff and broken his leg.

No, no; nobody can help him; I was not to tell anybody,' he said; 'only I am sure he would let me tell you. You would not steal anything that belonged to anybody else, even if you found it, would you, Miss Josceline?

'Indeed, I hope not, my dear. But what has your father lost? His purse?'

'Oh, no; I don't think he would care for that one half as much. It is his locket with

mamma's picture in it; he used to wear it on his watch-chain, you know.'

Ella remembered that he wore a locket of a heart-shape in dead gold-indeed Mrs. Armytage had once made a flippant allusion to it that Mr. Aird had resented extremely-and she said so. 'Now be very careful, Davey. Where did you walk to-day! I mean, which was the exact path you took up to the moment your father missed the locket?'

Oh, it's no use, Miss Josceline. I came back along it myself, and it was nowhere to be seen. Papa thought it just possible that he might have left it at home on his dressingtable, and sent me back to look; and if it wasn't there I was to go back to him.'

'But, my dear child, you have not had your lunch, and you look fagged and tired as

it is.'

'Oh, but I had rather go back to papa. I must go!'

'Very good, then I will go with you; only you shall have a bag of biscuits to put in pocket, to eat as you go along.'

your