ience.

"Freddy, I don't think Mabel ought to have any more jam," says Mrs.
Monkton, presently, "or Tommy either." She looks at the children as she
speaks, and sighs softly. "It will cost a great deal," says she.

"The jam!" says her husband. "Well, really, at the rate they are
consuming it--I----"

"Oh, no. The railway--the boat--the fare--the whole journey," says she.

"The journey?" says Joyce.

"Why, to England, to take them over there to see their grandmother,"
says Mrs. Monkton calmly.

"But, Barbara----"

"Well, dear?"

"I thought----"

"Barbara! I really consider that question decided," says her husband,
not severely, however. Is the dearest wish of his heart to be
accomplished at last? "I thought you had finally made up your mind to
refuse my mother's invitation?"

"I shall not refuse it," says she, slowly, "whatever you may do."

"I?"

"You said you didn't want to go," says his wife severely. "But I have
been thinking it over, and----" Her tone has changed, and a slight touch
of pink has come into her pretty cheeks. "After all, Freddy, why should
I be the one to keep you from your people?"

"You aren't keeping me. Don't go on that."

"Well, then, will you go by yourself and see them?"

"Certainly not."

"Not even if I give you the children to take over?".

"Not even then."

"You see," says she, with a sort of sad triumph, "I am keeping you from
them. What I mean is, that if you had never met me you would now be
friends with them."

"I'd a great deal rather be friends with you," says he struggling wildly
but firmly with a mutton chop that has been done to death by a bad cook.

"I know that," in a low and troubled tone, "but I know, too, that there
is always unhappiness where one is on bad terms with one's father and
mother."

"My dear girl, I can't say what bee you have got in your bonnet now, but
I beg you to believe, I am perfectly happy at this present moment, in
spite of this confounded chop that has been done to a chip. 'God sends
meat, the devil sends cooks.' That's not a prayer, Tommy, you needn't
commit it to memory."

"But there's 'God' and the 'devil' in it," says Tommy, skeptically:
"that always means prayers."

"Not this time. And you can't pray to both; your mother has taught you
that; you should teach her something in return. That's only fair, isn't
it?"

"She knows everything," says Tommy, dejectedly. It is quite plain to his
hearers that he regrets his mother's