ad a feeling of proprietorship in Mr Donne which was not
disagreeable. He had given the new M.P. his seat; his resolution,
his promptitude, his energy, had made Mr Donne "our member;" and Mr
Bradshaw began to feel proud of him accordingly. But there had been
no one circumstance during this period to bind Jemima and Mr Farquhar
together. They were still misunderstanding each other with all their
power. The difference in the result was this: Jemima loved him all
the more, in spite of quarrels and coolness. He was growing utterly
weary of the petulant temper of which he was never certain; of the
reception which varied day after day, according to the mood she was
in and the thoughts that were uppermost; and he was almost startled
to find how very glad he was that the little girls and Mrs Denbigh
were coming home. His was a character to bask in peace; and lovely,
quiet Ruth, with her low tones and quiet replies, her delicate waving
movements, appeared to him the very type of what a woman should be--a
calm, serene soul, fashioning the body to angelic grace.

It was, therefore, with no slight interest that Mr Farquhar inquired
daily after the health of little Leonard. He asked at the Bensons'
house; and Sally answered him, with swollen and tearful eyes, that
the child was very bad--very bad indeed. He asked at the doctor's;
and the doctor told him, in a few short words, that "it was only a
bad kind of measles, and that the lad might have a struggle for it,
but he thought he would get through. Vigorous children carried their
force into everything; never did things by halves; if they were ill,
they were sure to be in a high fever directly; if they were well,
there was no peace in the house for their rioting. For his part,"
continued the doctor, "he thought he was glad he had had no children;
as far as he could judge, they were pretty much all plague and no
profit." But as he ended his speech he sighed; and Mr Farquhar
was none the less convinced that common report was true, which
represented the clever, prosperous surgeon of Eccleston as bitterly
disappointed at his failure of offspring.

While these various interests and feelings had their course outside
the Chapel-house, within there was but one thought which possessed
all the inmates. When Sally was not cooking for the little invalid,
she was crying; for she had had a dream about green rushes, not
three months ago, which, by some queer process of oneiromancy she
interpreted