comfort
afterwards.

As he left the room, two rosy-faced boys, ragged and dirty, about eight
and nine years old, rushed into it just released from school, and coming
eagerly to see their sister, and tell that the Thrush was gone out of
harbour; Tom and Charles. Charles had been born since Fanny's going
away, but Tom she had often helped to nurse, and now felt a particular
pleasure in seeing again. Both were kissed very tenderly, but Tom she
wanted to keep by her, to try to trace the features of the baby she had
loved, and talked to, of his infant preference of herself. Tom, however,
had no mind for such treatment: he came home not to stand and be talked
to, but to run about and make a noise; and both boys had soon burst from
her, and slammed the parlour-door till her temples ached.

She had now seen all that were at home; there remained only two brothers
between herself and Susan, one of whom was a clerk in a public office
in London, and the other midshipman on board an Indiaman. But though she
had _seen_ all the members of the family, she had not yet _heard_ all
the noise they could make. Another quarter of an hour brought her a
great deal more. William was soon calling out from the landing-place of
the second story for his mother and for Rebecca. He was in distress
for something that he had left there, and did not find again. A key was
mislaid, Betsey accused of having got at his new hat, and some slight,
but essential alteration of his uniform waistcoat, which he had been
promised to have done for him, entirely neglected.

Mrs. Price, Rebecca, and Betsey all went up to defend themselves, all
talking together, but Rebecca loudest, and the job was to be done as
well as it could in a great hurry; William trying in vain to send Betsey
down again, or keep her from being troublesome where she was; the whole
of which, as almost every door in the house was open, could be plainly
distinguished in the parlour, except when drowned at intervals by the
superior noise of Sam, Tom, and Charles chasing each other up and down
stairs, and tumbling about and hallooing.

Fanny was almost stunned. The smallness of the house and thinness of the
walls brought everything so close to her, that, added to the fatigue of
her journey, and all her recent agitation, she hardly knew how to
bear it. _Within_ the room all was tranquil enough, for Susan having
disappeared with the others, there were soon only her father and herself
remaining; and