you to take a
house for me for six months. I should like Myrtlewood best, if it is to
be had. I have told Conrade all about it, and how pretty it is, and it
is so near you that I think there I can be happy as ever I can be again
in this world, and have your advice for the dear children.'"

"Poor darling! she seems but a child herself."

"My age--five and twenty," returned Rachel. "Well I shall go and ask
about the house. Remember, mother, this influx is to bring no trouble or
care on you; Fanny Temple is my charge from henceforth. My mission has
come to seek me," she added as she quitted the room, in eager excitement
of affection, emotion, and importance, for Fanny had been more like a
sister than a cousin.

Grace and Rachel Curtis were the daughters of the squire of the
Homestead; Fanny, of his brother, an officer in the army. Left at home
for education, the little girl had spent her life, from her seventh to
her sixteenth year, as absolutely one with her cousins, until she was
summoned to meet her father at the Cape, under the escort of his old
friend, General Sir Stephen Temple. She found Colonel Curtis sinking
under fatal disease, and while his relations were preparing to receive,
almost to maintain, his widow and daughter, they were electrified by the
tidings that the gentle little Fanny, at sixteen, had become the wife of
Sir Stephen Temple, at sixty.

From that time little had been known about her; her mother had continued
with her, but the two Mrs. Curtises had never been congenial or
intimate; and Fanny was never a full nor willing correspondent, feeling
perhaps the difficulty of writing under changed circumstances. Her
husband had been in various commands in the colonies, without returning
to England; and all that was known of her was a general impression that
she had much ill-health and numerous children, and was tended like an
infant by her bustling mother and doting husband. More than half a year
back, tidings had come of the almost sudden death of her mother; and
about three months subsequently, one of the officers of Sir Stephen's
staff had written to announce that the good old general had been killed
by a fall from his horse, while on a round of inspection at a distance
from home. The widow was then completely prostrated by the shock, but
promised to write as soon as she was able, and this was the fulfilment
of that promise, bringing the assurance that Fanny was coming back with
her little ones to th