on interest.'

"'Give me your arm, sir, back to the town,' said the old Baronet to me;
I feel myself too ill to go all alone.'

"'Get him to step into the house and take something,' whispered Whalley
in my ear, as he turned away and left us. But I was afraid to propose
it; indeed, if I had, I believe the old man would have had a fit on
the spot, for he trembled from head to foot, and drew long sighs, as if
recovering out of a faint.

"'Is there an inn near this,' asked he, where I can stop? and have you a
doctor here?'

"'You can have both, Sir Elkanah,' said I.

"'You know me, then?--you know who I am?' said he, hastily, as I called
him by his name.

"'That I do, sir, and I hold my place under you; my name is Shore.'

"'Yes, I remember,' said he, vaguely, as he moved away. When we came
to the gate on the road he turned around full and looked at the house,
overgrown with that rich red creeper that was so much admired. 'Mark my
words, my good man,' said he,--mark them well, and as sure as I live, I
'll not leave one stone on another of that dwelling there.'"

"He was promising more than he could perform," said the attorney.

"I don't know that," sighed the meek man; "there's very little that
money can't do in this life."

"And what has become of Whalley's widow,--if she be a widow?" asked one.

"She's in a poor way. She's up at the village yonder, and, with the help
of one of her girls, she's trying to keep a children's school."

"Lady Whalley's school?'" exclaimed one, in half sarcasm.

"Yes; but she has taken her maiden name again since this disaster, and
calls herself Mrs. Herbert."

"Has she more than one daughter, sir?" I asked of the last speaker.

"Yes, there are two girls; the younger one, they tell me, is going,
or gone abroad, to take some situation or other,--a teacher, or a
governess."

"No, sir," said the pluffy man, "Miss Kate has gone as companion to an
old widow lady at Brussels,--Mrs. Keats. I saw the letter that arranged
the terms,--a trifle less per annum than her mother gave to her maid."

"Poor girl!" sighed the sad man. "It 's a dreary way to begin life!"

I nodded assentingly to him, and with a smile of gratitude for his
sympathy. Indeed, the sentiment had linked me to him, and made me wish
to be beside him. The conversation now grew discursive, on the score of
all the difficulties that beset women when reduced to make efforts
for their own support; and though the speakers were