ected lady. The babe conducted himself with singular propriety
on this occasion. He received the Christian name of Byron Tennyson
Browning. May be prove worthy of his name and his parentage!"

The end of the war came at last, and found Colonel Lindsay among its
unharmed survivors. He returned with Myrtle to her native village, and
they established themselves, at the request of Miss Silence Withers, in
the old family mansion. Miss Cynthia, to whom Myrtle made a generous
allowance, had gone to live in a town not many miles distant, where she
had a kind of home on sufferance, as well as at The Poplars. This was a
convenience just then, because Nurse Byloe was invited to stay with them
for a month or two; and one nurse and two single women under the same
roof keep each other in a stew all the time, as the old dame somewhat
sharply remarked.

Master Byles Gridley had been appointed Myrtle's legal protector, and,
with the assistance of Mr. Penhallow, had brought the property she
inherited into a more manageable and productive form; so that, when
Clement began his fine studio behind the old mansion, he felt that at
least he could pursue his art, or arts, if he chose to give himself to
sculpture, without that dreadful hag, Necessity, standing by him to pinch
the features of all his ideals, and give them something of her own
likeness.

Silence Withers was more cheerful now that she had got rid of her
responsibility. She embellished her spare person a little more than in
former years. These young people looked so happy! Love was not so
unendurable, perhaps, after all. No woman need despair,--especially if
she has a house over her, and a snug little property. A worthy man, a
former missionary, of the best principles, but of a slightly jocose and
good-humored habit, thought that he could piece his widowed years with
the not insignificant, fraction of life left to Miss Silence, to their
mutual advantage. He came to the village, therefore, where Father
Pemberton was very glad to have him supply the pulpit in the place of his
unfortunate disabled colleague. The courtship soon began, and was brisk
enough; for the good man knew there was no time to lose at his period of
life,--or hers either, for that matter. It was a rather odd specimen of
love-making; for he was constantly trying to subdue his features to a
gravity which they were not used to, and she was as constantly
endeavoring to be as lively as possible, with the i