a further rise, and my poor
Annaple may get out of this drudgery. Please God, she and the little
one can stand it for a time, and I think she has a spring within her
that will;' then, as he saw tears in his cousin's eyes, he added,
'Don't be unhappy about it, Nuttie; I have had it in my mind ever so
long to tell you that the finding you at Micklethwayte was the best
thing that ever happened to me!'

Yes, so far as character went, Ursula could believe that it had been
so. He was twice the man he would have been without the incentive to
work, and the constant exercise of patience and cheerfulness; but her
heart was heavy with apprehension that the weight of the trial might be
too heavy. To her eyes the baby's life seemed extremely doubtful, and
Annaple looked so fragile that the increase of her burthens, any
saddening of the heart, might destroy her elasticity, and crush her
outright; while even Mark seemed to her to be toiling so close within
the limits of his powers that a straw might break the camel's back!

She longed to talk to Mr. Dutton about them, but she found herself
doomed to a day that perhaps Annaple would have thought more trying
than her harrowed life. She was a little later than she had intended,
and her father had been waiting impatiently to have a note read to him,
so he growled at her impatience to run after 'that Scotch girl.' And
the note happened to be of an irritating nature; moreover, the cutlets
at luncheon were said to be akin to indiarubber, and there was the
wrong flavour in the sauce. Ursula let that cook do what she pleased
without remonstrance.

Even Alwyn did not afford as much satisfaction as usual, for the boy
was in high spirits and wanted to blow a little trumpet, which was more
than his father could stand. He was very good when this was silenced,
but he then began to rush round the room daring his sister to catch the
wild colt as he went by. This had likewise to be stopped, with the
murmur that Ursula spoilt the child.

She tried to compose matters by turning out the old toys in the
ottoman, but Alwyn had outgrown most of them, and did not care for any
except a certain wooden donkey, minus one ear and a leg, which went by
the name of Sambo, and had absorbed a good deal of his affection. He
had with difficulty been consoled for Sambo being left behind, and now
turned over everything with considerable clatter in search of him.
Alas! Sambo could nowhere be found in the room