ion, was naturally not recognised. He was received with the
ordinary everyday friendliness. But a change had occurred in the family
circumstances, nothing less than that they sat now in the long neglected
and still unfurnished room which went by the name of the drawing-room.
The windows had been thrown open, and the covering taken from the family
carriage. There it stood, still wheelless, but occupied now by Sophia
and Mrs. Rexford, the girls and the darning basket, while some of the
children climbed upon the box. Blue and Red, who were highly delighted
with the arrangement, explained it to Trenholme.

"You see, we had a carriage we couldn't use, and a room we couldn't use
for want of furniture; so this rainy day, when we all were so tired of
the other room, mamma suddenly thought that we'd make the carriage do
for furniture. It's the greatest fun possible." They gave little jumps
on the soft cushions, and were actually darning with some energy on
account of the change.

Trenholme shook hands with the carriage folk in the gay manner necessary
to the occasion, but his heart ached for the little mother who had thus
so bravely buried her last vestige of pride in the carriage by giving it
to her children as a plaything.

"It's more comfortable than armchairs, and keeps the feet from the bare
floor," she said to him, in defiance of any criticisms he might have in
mind. But all his thought was with and for her, and in this he was
pleased to see that he had divined Sophia's mind, for, after adding her
warm but brief praise to the new arrangement, she changed the subject.

Winifred went upstairs quietly. Trenholme suggested that he hardly
thought her looking quite well.

"She's an odd child," said Sophia. "I did not tell you, mamma, what I
found her doing the other day. She was trying on the white frock she had
this spring when she was confirmed. It's unlike her to do a thing like
that for no reason; and when I teased her she began to cry, and then
began speaking to me about religion. She has been puzzled by the views
your housekeeper holds, Mr. Trenholme, and excited by old Cameron's
teaching about the end of the world."

"I don't think it's the end of the world he's prophesying exactly," said
Trenholme, musingly. "The Adventists believe that the earth will not be
ruined, but glorified by the Second Advent."

"Children should not hear of such abstruse, far-off things," observed
Mrs. Rexford; "it does harm; but with no n