s to shake hands with the hall porter, and
the boots who took our luggage, and ask after their sisters and their
mothers, and their sweethearts--the man knew them all. And when he heard
from his boy, Willie Quarrie, that the cook was a person from Michael,
it was as much as I could do to keep him from tearing down to the
kitchen to talk about old times."

"Yes, I see," said Jenny; "he has made a fortune, but he is just the same
simple Manx lad that he was ten years ago."

"Just, just! We can't go out for a walk together but he shouts, 'How
do? Fine day, mates!' to the drivers of the hackney cabs across the
promenade; and the joy of his life is to get up at seven in the morning
and go down to the quay before breakfast to keep tally with a chalk
for the fishermen counting their herrings out of the boats into the
barrels."

"Not a bit changed, then, since he went away?" said Jenny, before the
glass.

"Not a bit; and because I asked him to know his place, and if he is a
gentleman to behave as a gentleman and speak as a gentleman and not make
so easy with such as don't respect him any the better for it, he turns
on me and tells me I've only married him for his money."

"Dreadful!" said Jenny, fixing her fringe. "And is this the old
sweetheart you have waited ten years for?"

"Indeed, it is."

"And now that he has come back and you've married him, he has parted
from you in ten days?"

"Yes; and it will be the talk of the island--indeed it will."

"Shocking! And so he has left you here on your honeymoon without a penny
to bless yourself?"

"Oh, for the matter of that, he fixed something on me before the
wedding--a jointure, the advocates called it."

"Terrible! Let me see. He's the one who sent you presents from America?"

"Oh; he piled presents enough on me. It's the way of the men: the
stingiest will do that. They like to think they're such generous
creatures. But let a poor woman count on it, and she'll soon be wakened
from her dream. 'You married me for my money--deny it?'"

"Fearful!"

Jenny was leaning her forehead against the window sash, and looking
vacantly out on the bay. Nelly observed her a moment, stopped suddenly
in the tale of her troubles, and said, in another voice, "Jenny Crow,
I believe you are laughing at me. It's always the way with you. You can
take nothing seriously."

Jenny turned back to the room with a solemn face, and said, "Nellie,
if you waited ten years for your husband, I supp