o such
a delicious old place. It was the queerest of all queer abodes, was
Woodford Cottage. The entrance-door and the stable-door stood side by
side; and the cellar-staircase led out of the drawing-room. The direct
way from the kitchen to the dining-room was through a suite of sleeping
apartments; and the staircase, apparently cut out of the wall, had a
beautiful little break-neck corner, which seemed made to prevent any one
who once ascended from ever descending alive. Certainly the contriver
of Woodford Cottage must have had some slight twist of the brain, which
caused the building to partake of the same pleasant convolution.

Yet, save this slight peculiarity, it was a charming house to live in.
It stood in a garden, whose high walls shut out all view, save of the
trees belonging to an old dilapidated, uninhabited lodge, where an
illustrious statesman had once dwelt, and which was now creeping to
decay and oblivion, like the great man's own memory. The trees waved,
and the birds sang therein for the especial benefit of Woodford Cottage
and of Olive Rothesay. She, who so dearly loved a garden, perfectly
exulted in this. Most delightful was its desolate untrimmed
luxuriance--where the peaches grew almost wild upon the wall, and one
gigantic mulberry-tree looked beautiful all the year through. Moreover,
climbing over the picturesque, bay-windowed house, was such a clematis!
Its blossoms glistened like a snow-shower throughout the day; and, in
the night-time, its perfume was a very breath of Eden. Altogether the
house was a grand old house--just suited for a dreamer, a poet, or
an artist. An artist did really inhabit it, which had been no small
attraction to draw Olive thither. But of him more anon.

At present let us look at the mother and daughter, as they sit in the
one parlour to which all the glories of Meri-vale Hall and Oldchurch had
dwindled. But they did not murmur at that, for they were together; and
now that the first bitterness of their loss had passed away, they began
to feel cheerful--even happy.

Olive was flitting in and out of the window which opened into the
garden, and bringing thence her apron full of flowers to dispose about
the large, somewhat gloomy, and scantily-furnished room. Mrs. Rothesay
was sitting in the sunshine, engaged in some delicate needlework. In the
midst of it she stopped, and her hands fell with a heavy sigh.

"It is of no use, Olive."

"What is of no use, mamma?"

"I canno