ion, only sorry
that Randolph could not make one of the party. He came home, however, in
good time in the afternoon, and they all had a very merry tea together.

'What a nice birthday it's been!' said Bride, as she and Alie kissed
Celestina, whose mother managed to spare an hour to come to fetch her
and at the same time to wish Biddy 'many happy returns.' 'How good of
you to dress the dolls for me, Mrs. Fairchild!' she went on. 'I think
I shall love the doll-house more and more every day, for, you see, it's
full of kind things you've all done for me. And I'm going to keep it
_so_ neat. Mamma will be quite surprised when she comes home to find how
neat I've learnt to be.'

'And only think, Mrs. Fairchild,' added Rosalys; 'do you know that papa
and mamma will most likely be home in one month? Just fancy, how nice!'

The 'most likely' came true. One month saw Mr. and Mrs. Vane safe back
at Seacove; 'papa' so bright and well, so bronzed and ruddy too, that it
was difficult to believe he was the same feeble-looking invalid who had
started on his long journey nine weeks before.

* * * * *

It is not often--very seldom, indeed--that I am able to tell my readers
'what became of' the children they have come to know, and sometimes, I
hope, to care for in these simple stories. But as it is now many years
ago since the Vane family came to Seacove Rectory, and as Randolph and
his sisters and Celestina Fairchild have long ago been grown-up people,
I can give you another peep of them some eight or ten years after the
birthday I have been telling you about.

The curtain rises again on a different scene.

It is a lovely, old-fashioned garden, exquisitely neat and filled with
plants and flowers, showing at their best in the bright soft light of a
midsummer afternoon. A rectory garden, but not Seacove. Poor Seacove,
with its sandy soil and near neighbourhood to the sea, could not have
produced the velvety grass of that old bowling-green, now (for we are
still speaking of a good many years ago) a croquet-ground, or the
luxuriant 'rose hedge' bordering one end. Two girls were walking slowly
up and down the wide terrace walk in front of the low windows, talking
as they walked. One was tall and slight, with a fair sweet face--a very
lovely face, and one that no one loved and admired more heartily than
did her younger sister.

'Alie dear, I do hope you've had a happy birthday,' said
Bridget--sixteen-year