dren
now!"

"Bless me!" exclaimed Mrs Orgreave, taking off her eyeglasses and
wiping them, "I'd missed Tom's youngest."

"You'd better not tell Emily that," said Janet. (Emily was the mother
of Tom's children.) "Here, give me those eyeglasses, dear. You'll never
get them right with a linen handkerchief. Where's your bit of chamois?"

Mrs Orgreave absently and in somewhat stiff silence handed over the
pince-nez! She was now quite an old woman, small, shapeless, and
delightfully easy-going, whose sense of humour had not developed with
age. She could never see a joke which turned upon her relations with
her grandchildren, and in fact the jocular members of the family had
almost ceased to employ this subject of humour. She was undoubtedly
rather foolish about her grandchildren--`fond,' as they say down there.
The parents of the grandchildren did not object to this foolishness--
that is, they only pretended to object. The task of preventing a
pardonable weakness from degenerating into a tedious and mischievous
mania fell solely upon Janet. Janet was ready to admit that the health
of the grandchildren was a matter which could fairly be left to their
fathers and mothers, and she stood passive when Mrs Orgreave's
grandmotherly indulgences seemed inimical to their health; but Mrs
Orgreave was apt to endanger her own health in her devotion to the
profession of grandmother--for example by sitting up to unchristian
hours with a needle. Then there would be a struggle of wills, in which
of course Mrs Orgreave, being the weaker, was defeated; though her
belief survived that she and she alone, by watchfulness, advice,
sagacity, and energy, kept her children's children out of the grave. On
all other questions the harmony between Janet and her mother was
complete, and Mrs Orgreave undoubtedly considered that no mother had
ever had a daughter who combined so many virtues and charms.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

TWO.

Mr Orgreave, forgetful of the company, was deciphering the "British
Medical Journal" in the twilight of the afternoon. His doctor had lent
him this esoteric periodical because there was an article therein on
influenza, and Mr Orgreave was very much interested in influenza.

"You remember the influenza of '89, Edwin?" he asked suddenly, looking
over the top of the paper.

"Do I?" said Edwin. "Yes, I fancy I do remember a sort of epidemic."

"I should think so