rather for show than
for use, were just assumed to go to church on Sundays, and then laid
aside for the week. So exact was their economy.

The only extravagance in which Mrs. King indulged herself was keeping
a pet spaniel, the descendant of a breed for which her husband had been
famous, and which was so great a favourite, that it ranked next to Tom
in her affections, and next to his grandmother in Tom's. The first time
that I ever saw them, this pretty dog had brought her kind mistress into
no small trouble.

We had been taking a drive through these beautiful lanes, never more
beautiful than when the richly tinted autumnal foliage contrasts with
the deep emerald hue of the autumnal herbage, and were admiring the fine
effect of the majestic oaks, whose lower branches almost touched the
clear water which reflected so brightly the bright blue sky, when Mrs.
King, who was well known to my father, advanced to the gate of her
little court, and modestly requested to speak with him.

The group in front of the cottage door was one which it was impossible
to contemplate without strong interest. The poor widow, in her neat
crimped cap, her well-worn mourning gown, her apron and handkerchief
coarse, indeed, and of cheap material, but delicately clean, her grey
hair parted on her brow, and her pale intelligent countenance, stood
leaning against the doorway, holding in one thin trembling hand a letter
newly opened, and in the other her spectacles, which she had been fain
to take off, half hoping that they had played her false, and that the
ill-omened epistle would not be found to contain what had so grieved
her. Tom, a fine rosy boy, stout and manly for his years, sat on the
ground with Chloe in his arms, giving vent to a most unmanly fit of
crying; and Chloe, a dog worthy of Edwin Landseer's pencil, a large and
beautiful spaniel, of the scarce old English breed, brown and white,
with shining wavy hair feathering her thighs and legs, and clustering
into curls towards her tail and forehead, and upon the long glossy
magnificent ears which gave so much richness to her fine expressive
countenance, looked at him wistfully, with eyes that expressed the
fullest sympathy in his affliction, and stooped to lick his hand, and
nestled her head in his bosom, as if trying, as far as her caresses had
the power, to soothe and comfort him.

"And so, sir," continued Mrs. King, who had been telling her little
story to my father, whilst I had been