dness
with which you have treated my untoward son, and likewise for having
opened my eyes to the root of his freakishness."

The Doctor understood this as dismissal, and asked for his horse,
intimating, however, that he would gladly keep the boy till some
arrangement had been decided upon. Then he rode home to tell his
sister-in-law that he had done his best, and that he thought it a
fortunate conjunction that the travelled brother had been present.

CHAPTER VI: A RELAPSE

"A tell-tale in their company
They never could endure,
And whoso kept not secretly
Their pranks was punished sure.
It was a just and Christian deed
To pinch such black and blue;
Oh, how the commonwealth doth need
Such justices as you!"

BISHOP CORBETT.

Several days passed, during which there could be no doubt that
Peregrine Oakshott knew how to behave himself, not merely to grown-
up people, but to little Anne, who had entirely lost her dread of
him, and accepted him as a playfellow. He was able to join the
family meals, and sit in the pleasant garden, shaded by the walls of
the old castle, as well as by its own apple-trees, and looking out
on the little bay in front, at full tide as smooth and shining as a
lake.

There, while Anne did her task of spinning or of white seam, Mrs.
Woodford would tell the children stories, or read to them from the
Pilgrim's Progress, a wonderful romance to both. Peregrine, still
tamed by weakness, would lie on the grass at her feet, in a tranquil
bliss such as he had never known before, and his fairy romances to
Anne were becoming mitigated, when one day a big coach came along
the road from Fareham, with two boys riding beside it, escorting
Lady Archfield and Mistress Lucy.

The lady was come to study Mrs. Woodford's recipe for preserved
cherries, the young people, Charles, Lucy, and their cousin Sedley,
now at home for the summer holidays, to spend an afternoon with
Mistress Anne.

Great was Lady Archfield's surprise at finding that Major Oakshott's
cross-grained slip of a boy was still at Portchester.

"If you were forced to take him in for very charity when he was
hurt," she said, "I should have thought you would have been rid of
him as soon as he could leave his bed."

"The road to Oakwood is too rough for broken ribs as yet," said Mrs.
Woodford, "nor is the poor boy ready for discipline."

"Ay, I fancy that Major Oakshott is a bitter Puritan in his own
house; but no discipli