pe was good for my health, and now you see it has
preserved the whole family."

"I don't see that," said the troublesome Jane: "what was the use of your
being there intermeddling?"

"Jane," said one severely, "if you will be still, you will probably
learn. How can you expect to hear anything when you keep on interrupting
Clarice like this?"

"I am coming to that now, Jane. What he thus saw and heard he most
patiently, and heroically, and from the noblest motives--"

"Excuse me, ladies," said I. "My pipe is not handy, but I must go out
and smoke a cigar. I want to see a man--"

"Let the man smoke the cigar, and that will provide for both of them.
You will sit down, Robert, and hear me out; I am not to be overruled
this time."

"It would give me the greatest pleasure to hear you out, my dear, but
you know your health is delicate, and you are not accustomed to public
speaking. This is the longest oration you ever made: Jane's constant
interruptions are trying, and you must be fatigued. If I were you, I
would rest now, and finish this up to-morrow."

"Now isn't that exactly like him?" cried the irrepressible Jane. "He is
afraid of your exposures, as well he may be. Go on, Clarice, and tell us
what other iniquities he has committed, besides deceiving Mabel and me
about this, while he was questioning us all the time, and pretending to
impart all he knew."

"He deceived me too. Yes, you may well stare; he kept this absolutely to
himself, till he could use it for his own deep purposes; and"--she
blushed a little--"that is why things are as they are."

I saw she wanted to be helped out, so I said.

"Yes, that is the cause of this thusness. You see, Mabel, what great
results may spring from a little pipe. Jane, you will have to admit
that I am the guardian angel and protecting genius of you all."

"Well, Clarice," said Jane, "I will own that my estimate of his talents
has risen lately; but then my confidence in his moral character has
fallen in the same degree. He does tell such dreadful falsehoods."

"It is not quite as if he told them for love of them, simply for the
pleasure he takes in falsehood itself. You must allow for his motives."

"Yes," said Mabel, "his motives are always excellent, whatever his words
and actions may be. You remember the man in the Bible, who was delivered
to Satan for his soul's sake; and I have heard Robert himself say that
in ascending a mountain you often have to go down hill."

"S