hose who love me.
Your daughter Faith is a sweet young woman, just what I should wish
for a child of mine to be. And Horatia, my godchild, will turn out very
well, if a sharp hand is kept over her. But she takes after me, she is
daring and ambitious, and requires a firm hand at the helm. Read this
to her, with my love, and I dare say she will only laugh at it. If she
marries to my liking, she will be down for a good thing in my will, some
day. God bless us all. Amen. Amen.

"'Yours affectionately,

"'NELSON AND BRONTE.'"

"Take it to heart, my dear; and so must I," said the Admiral, laughing
at the face his daughter made; "your godfather is a most excellent judge
of everybody's character except his own. But, bless me, my dear, why,
you are crying! You silly little thing! I was only in fun. You shall
marry to his liking, and be down for the good thing. Look up, and laugh
at everybody, my darling. No one laughs so merrily as my pretty Dolly.
Why, Faith, what does she mean by this?"

To the coaxing voice of her father, and the playful glance that she used
to play with, Dolly had not rushed up at all, either with mind, or, if
that failed, with body, as she always used to do. She hurried towards
the door, as if she longed to be away from them; and then, as if she
would rather not make any stir about it, sat down and pretended to have
caught her dress in something.

"The only thing is to let her go on as she likes," Faith said aloud,
so that Dolly might hear all of it; "I have done all I can, but she
believes herself superior. She cannot bear any sort of contradiction,
and she expects one to know what she says, without her saying it. There
is nothing to be done but to treat her the same way. If she is left to
herself, she may come back to it."

"Well, my dear children," said the Admiral, much alarmed at the prospect
of a broil between them, such as he remembered about three years back,
"I make no pretence to understand your ways. If you were boys, it would
be different altogether. But the Almighty has been pleased to make
you girls, and very good ones too; in fact, there are none to be found
better. You have always been bound up with one another and with me; and
every one admires all the three of us. So that we must be content if
a little thing arises, not to make too much of it, but bear with one
another, and defy anybody to come in between us. Kiss one another, my
dears, and be off; for I have much correspondence t