inued in chapter sixteen.

CHAPTER XV

MERELY A HUMBLE INTERRUPTION AND
ILLUSTRATION OF THE LAST

Some peaceable afternoon when Mrs. Mesurier was enjoying a little doze
on the parlour sofa, and her three elder daughters were snatching an
hour or two from housework--they had already left school--for a little
private reading, the drowsy house would suddenly be awakened by one loud
wooden knock at the door.

"Now, whoever can that be!" the three girls would impatiently exclaim;
and presently the maid would come to Miss Esther to say that there was
an old man at the door asking for Mrs. Mesurier.

"What's his name, Jane?"

"He wouldn't give it, miss. He said it would be all right. Mrs. Mesurier
would know him well enough."

"Whoever can it be? What's he like, Jane?"

"He looks like a workman, miss,--very old, and rather dotey."

"Who can it be? Go and ask him his name again."

Esther would then arouse her mother; and the maid would come in to say
that at last the old man had been persuaded to confide his name as
Clegg--Samuel Clegg.

"Tell the missus it's Samuel Clegg," the old man had said, with a
certain amusing conceit. "She'll be glad enough to see Samuel Clegg."

"Why!" said Mrs. Mesurier, "it's your father's poor old uncle, Mr.
Clegg. Now, girls, you mustn't run away, but try and be nice to him.
He's a simple, good, old man."

Mrs. Mesurier was no more interested in Mr. Clegg than her daughters;
but she had a great fund of humanity, and an inexhaustible capacity for
suffering bores brilliantly.

"Why, I never!" she would say, adapting her idiom to make the old man
feel at home, as he was presently ushered in, chuntering and triumphant;
"you don't mean to say it's Uncle Clegg. Well, we are glad to see you! I
was just having a little nap, and so you must excuse my keeping
you waiting."

"Ay, Mary. It's right nice of you to make me so welcome. I got a bit
misdoubtful at the door, for the young maid seemed somehow a little
frightened of me; but when I told the name it was all right. 'Samuel
Clegg,' I said. 'She'll be glad enough to see Samuel Clegg,' I said."

"Glad indeed," murmured Mrs. Mesurier, "I should think so. Find a chair
for your uncle, Esther."

"Ay, the name did it," chuckled the old man, who as a matter of fact was
anything but a humble old person, and to whom the bare fact of
existence, and the name of Clegg, seemed warrant enough for thinking
quite a lot of yourself.

"I'm a