e,--if you'd think a bit less of sparing her, and
she'd think a bit more of sparing you, it would be a sight better for
poor Faith and poor Edith too."

"I? I don't want to be spared," answered Edith.

"No, you don't, and that's just it. And Faith does. And she oughtn't.
And you oughtn't."

"Nay, Temperance. Remember, she is a widow."

"Small chance of my forgetting it. Doesn't she tell me so six dozen
times a day? Ask Faith to do any thing she loveth not, and she's always
a widow. I've had my thoughts whether I could not be an orphan when I'm
wanted to do something disagreeable. What think you?"

"I think your bark is worse than your bite, Temperance," said Edith,
smiling.

"I'm about weary of barking," answered Temperance, laying smooth a piece
of cobweb lawn. "I think I'll bite, one of these days. Deary me, but
there are widows of divers sorts! If ever there were what Paul calls `a
widow indeed,' it is my Lady Lettice; and she doesn't make a screen of
it, as Faith does, against all the east winds that blow. Well, well!
Give me that pin-case, Lettice, and the black girdle yonder; I lack
somewhat to fill up this corner. What hour must we be at Selwick,
Edith?"

"At five o' the clock the horses are bidden."

"Very good. You'll bide to supper?"

"Nay, not without I can help you."

"You'll not help me without you'll tell Faith she's a snivelling
lazy-bones, and that you'll not, I know. Go and get your beauty-sleep--
and comfort Lady Lettice all you can."

When Edith had departed, and the packing was finished, the aunt and
niece went down to supper. It consisted of Polony sausages, sweetmeats,
and an egg-pie--a Lancashire dainty, which Rachel the cook occasionally
sent up, for she was a native of that county. During the entire meal,
Faith kept up a slow rain of lamentations, for her widowhood, the sad
necessity of leaving her home, and the entire absence of sympathy which
she experienced in all around her: till at last her sister inquired--

"Faith, will you have any more pie?"

"N-o," said Faith with a sob, having eaten nearly half of it.

"Nor any more sausage?"

"Oh no!" she answered, heaving a weary sigh.

"Nor sucketts [sweetmeats; subsequently spelt _succadet_] neither?"

Faith shook her head dolefully.

"Then I'll help you to a little of one other thing, which you need
sorely; and that's a bit of advice."

Faith moaned behind her handkerchief.

"As to quitting home, that's