biographies furnished by
Miss Blomfield. She was delicate in health, but reticent and resolute
in character. She was ready for any amount of self-sacrifice. She
contributed liberally to our box; and I fancy that she and Polly
continued it after I had gone back to Dacrefield.

My new ideas were not laid aside on my return home. To the best of my
ability I had given Nurse Bundle an epitome of the sermon on
alms--deeds which had so taken my fancy, and I have reason to believe
that she was very proud of my precocious benevolence. Whilst the
subject was under discussion betwixt us, she related many anecdotes of
the good deeds of the "young gentlemen and ladies" in a certain
clergyman's family where she had lived as nursemaid in her younger
days; and my imagination was fired by dreams of soup-cans, coal-clubs,
linsey petticoats comforting the rheumatic limbs of aged women,
opportune blankets in winter, Sunday-school classes, etc., etc.

"My dear!" said Nurse Bundle, almost with tears in her eyes, "you're
for all the world your dear mamma over again. Keep them notions, my
dear, when you're a grown gentleman, and there'll be a blessing on all
you do. For in all reason it's you that'll have to look to your pa's
property and tenants some time."

My father, though not himself an adept in the details of what is
commonly called "parish work," was both liberal and kind-hearted. He
liked my knowing the names of his tenants, and taking an interest in
their families. He was well pleased to respond by substantial help
when Nurse Bundle and I pleaded for this sick woman or that unshod
child, as my mother had pleaded in old days. As for Nurse Bundle, she
had a code of virtues for "young ladies and gentlemen," as such, and
charity to the poor was among them. Though I confess that I think she
regarded it more in the light of a grace adorning a certain station,
than as a duty incumbent upon all men.

So I came to know most of the villagers; and being a quaint child,
with a lively and amusing curiosity, which some little refinement and
good-breeding stayed from degenerating into impertinence, I was, I
believe, very popular.

One afternoon, during the spring that followed our return from London,
I had strolled out with Rubens, and was bowling my hoop towards one of
the lodges when a poor woman passed by on the drive (which was a
public road through the park), her apron to her face, weeping
bitterly. I stopped her, and asked what was the