a difficulty in leaving her Home. Had she many
children about her when you were there?'

'Ten or twelve.'

'Do they all come from London?' asked Annabel.

'Yes. She has relations with sundry hospitals and the like. By-the-by,
she told me one remarkable story. A short time ago out of eight
children that were in the house only one could read--a little girl of
ten--and this one regularly received letters from home. Now there came
for her what seemed to be a small story-paper, or something of the
kind, in a wrapper. Mrs. Ormonde gave it her without asking any
questions, and, in the course of the morning, happening to see her
reading it, she went to look what the paper was. It proved to be an
anti-Christian periodical, and on the front page stood a woodcut
offered as a burlesque illustration of some Biblical incident. "Father
always brings it home and gives it me to read," said the child. "It
makes me laugh!"'

'Probably she knew nothing of the real meaning of it all,' said Mr.
Newthorpe.

'On the contrary, she understood the tendency of the paper surprisingly
well; her father had explained everything to the family.'

'One of the interesting results of popular education,' remarked Mr.
Newthorpe philosophically. 'It is inevitable.'

'What did Mrs. Ormonde do?' Annabel asked.

'It was a difficult point. No good would have been done by endeavouring
to set the child against her father; she would be home again in a
fortnight. So Mrs. Ormonde simply asked if she might have the paper
when it was done with, and, having got possession, threw it into the
fire with vast satisfaction. Happily it didn't come again.'

'What a gross being that father must be!' Annabel exclaimed.

'Gross enough,' Egremont replied, 'yet I shouldn't wonder if he had
brains above the average in his class. A mere brute wouldn't do a thing
of that kind; ten to one he honestly believed that he was benefiting
the girl; educating her out of superstition.'

'But why should the poor people be left to such ugly-minded teachers?'
Annabel exclaimed. 'Surely those influences may be opposed?'

'I doubt whether they can be,' said her father. 'The one insuperable
difficulty lies in the fact that we have no power greater than
commercial enterprise. Nowadays nothing will succeed save on the
commercial basis; from church to public-house the principle applies.
There is no way of spreading popular literature save on terms of supply
and demand. Take the Education