pleases. It may not be the same Ranesford family after all. If she were Mary I should think perhaps not; but Clara is not a very common name. Ethel never spoke to me of the Widow Ranesford, or called upon her, that I know. I think she has not known Clara Ranesford very long; they are in the same boarding house. Ethel's father was rich and her home was miles from the Ranesfords'; besides, this girl was sent away, or allowed to go, when she was such a young girl. I think I do like the sister for them better than the coronet.

"In both cases you have something to do," teased her husband, "for you couldn't get the coronet without writing to England."

"I'll write to New York first," was her decision.

The minister went into his study, not to prepare the morrow's sermon, but to pray for the morrow's preacher, and that the heart of the people might be opened to hear his words, that not one might fall to the ground.

The preacher to-morrow would be the usual " supply." Two weeks ago, the first Sunday in December, Communion Sunday, Paul French had preached his last sermon to his dear people.

He was kindly urged to keep the parsonage for his home until his house was built; all the parish knew that Dolly French was planning to build a house for her husband's rest and refreshment, now that he was "laid aside" by nervous trouble following long over

work. At the sitting-room table Dolly wrote her letter to Ethel Underwood:

"Don't break this state of things to your friend in your usual headlong way; you are not the bearer of good tidings. (Neither am I.) The mother may live months and friends may spring up. But just use some of the tact you are trying to cultivate, you outspoken thing, and write me the result. Mrs. Ranesford has no desire to be reconciled to her stepdaughter, probably feeling that she is reconciled when she bequeathes to her the care of her sister and brother.

"It will be no special comfort to her to see Miss Ranesford or to make any arrangement. There will be some money after the mortgage is paid. The farm was left to her by her husband's will; the elder daughter was cut off with the usual shilling; she expects to make her will and leave whatever there will be left after her funeral expenses are paid (unless I do that, she told me) to these two children. One of our rich men holds the mortgage; the interest never has been paid; he will not foreclose until after her death. The children will not be left homeless; somebody will take them in for a while. I make this plain that your friend, if she is the long-lost sister, need feel no undue haste in taking upon herself this new and harrowing responsibility.

"If, as you hinted, your husband's partner is 'paying attentions' to her, her marriage may interfere, or these children may interfere with it. That depends

upon the stuff that is in this girl. I believe in hardship, having once upon a time had a little of it myself. May this hardship be good for your friend."

She enclosed her letter and addressed it to Mrs. Guy Underwood, Twenty-second street, New York City. "Aunt Matilda, I am glad our house is to be in the country."

"So am I," replied the white-haired lady knitting a black silk mitten near the lamp.

"I believe I would like to be like Hannah More. Don't you remember that those five sisters educated a thousand poor children?"

"Hannah More was a hundred years ago."

“Oh, I would be up to the times," said Dolly French; "I want a large house.

Paul says I may have it as large as I want it, and keep it as full.

To think that one of the dreams of my silly girlhood should be so near coming true! It was more than a dream, though. My country people are not like Hannah More's. Mine are American girls and women. I shall get more than I give.

"I remember this about Hannah More. In a village where she sought to open a Sunday-school, they begged her not to do it, saying religion would be the ruin of agriculture, and had done nothing but mischief since it had been brought in by the monks at Glastonbury. In another village she was refused a roof for her Sundayschool and collected a few children to sing hymns under

an apple tree, from which they were driven by the owner of the tree, who believed the singing would blight the tree. Hymns sung by Methodists had blighted an apple tree belonging to his mother.

“That was in the days when even thrifty mothers bought rags by the pound and patched them together to make clothing for the children. Brushes and combs they had none. Lady Hester and Lord Herbert are patched, as well as brushless and combless. I'll do one thing. I'll teach them to read and write this winter, to draw, if it is in them, and the girl to sew. Hester is a captivating child when she looks up and listens, and Herbert looks like a poet, with his long eyelashes. There is good stuff in both of them. I will found my household before the foundations of my house are laid. Where in this wide, dear, beautiful world, auntie, do you suppose my house will be?"

"I do not suppose; I would rather wait and know." "If Paul has a garden and I have a house, it is all I want."

"Besides people," suggested Mrs. Scarlett.

CHAPTER II

A BOOK AND A BOX OF CANDY

Time, through every moment of it resting on Eternity.-Carlyle.

LARA RANESFORD stood near the table in the

CLAR

small reception room with her hat and coat on. She never had acknowledged to herself that she liked to rest here a few moments before going up to her fourth-story housekeeping because Owen Rathbun's latchkey was turned in the door about this time, and he liked to stop for a moment before he went up to his handsome second-floor bachelor apartment. It was Saturday afternoon; on the table were laid her few shopping parcels.

The click of the latchkey brought the color to her clear, colorless cheeks. She snatched her bundles and started, but Owen Rathbun pushed aside the heavy portières and entered; in his hand were a book and a box of candy. He handed them both to her and told her that the book was the "Journal Intime."

"I hardly know whether the book is good for you or not."

"After I have read it you will know.'

"I am in sympathy with his moods, eternal selfchronicler, as he called himself, but he was a self worth

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