ch, even in a ball-room."

"Well, I dare say she saw you had had rather little preaching in the
bush, and I am sure you were none the worse of all said to you. But it
makes us the more vexed at losing the real value of my bit property,
for if I had had the twenty-five hundred pounds you speak about we
could have begun business in Melbourne together. She can keep books,
and Miss Elsie has a clever hand at the millinery;--we could have got
on famously. I must let you see the bairns' writingbooks, and the
letters she learns them to write, and their counting-books, too."

Mr. Brandon looked and admired quite to Peggy's satisfaction; and then
he spoke to the old man in a kindly way, calling him Mr. Lowrie, and
saying he had often heard Peggy speak of him at Barragong. How much
pleasure little courtesies like this give to poverty and old age! The
old man's face brightened when he heard that he was known at such a
distance by such a gentleman as this, and he answered Mr. Brandon's
inquiries as to his health and his hearing with eager garrulity.

"Well," said Peggy, "I am no poorer than I was if I had not known about
the bit shop being worth so much; but when I think on Miss Jean and her
sister, and the lift it might have been to them, I think more of it
than I would otherwise do. And now, Mr. Brandon, I'll trouble you to
move from the fireside; I must put out the kail. But you were aye fond
of being in a body's way."

"I have it," said Mr. Brandon; "it will do."

"What will do?"

"You remember the Phillipses?"

"What should ail me to remember them? But I have such a poor head, I
forget to ask the thing I care most about. How's Mr. Phillips, and
how's Emily?"

"All well, and the other four, too."

"And Mrs. Phillips?"

"As well as ever, and handsomer than ever, I think."

"Oh! her looks were never her worst fault. But what did you mean by
saying it would do?"

"The Phillipses came home in the vessel with me, and are settled in
London for good. I think the eldest Miss Melville would be exactly the
sort of person they want to superintend the household, for Mrs.
Phillips has as little turn for management as ever, and there is a
considerable establishment. And, also, she might make Miss Emily and
Miss Harriett attend to their lessons, for, though they have masters or
some such things, they are too much the mistresses of the house to be
controlled by anybody."

"Their father was always very much taken up with these