care! I! I! No, no, it is you,--you who want
care. I shall be well to-morrow,--quite well, don't fear. He shall not
be sent away from me; he shall not, sir. Oh, Grandfather,
Grandfather, how could you?" She flung herself on his breast, clinging
there,--clinging as if infancy and age were but parts of the same whole.

"But," said the Mayor, "it is not as if you were going to school, my
dear; you are going for a holiday. And your grandfather must leave
you,--must travel about; 'tis his calling. If you fell ill and were with
him, think how much you would be in his way. Do you know," he added,
smiling, "I shall begin to fear that you are selfish."

"Selfish!" exclaimed Waife, angrily.

"Selfish!" echoed Sophy, with a melancholy scorn that came from a
sentiment so deep that mortal eye could scarce fathom it. "Oh, no, sir!
can you say it is for his good, not for what he supposes mine that
you want us to part? The pretty cottage, and all for me; and what for
him?--tramp, tramp along the hot dusty roads. Do you see that he is
lame? Oh, Sir, I know him; you don't. Selfish! he would have no merry
ways that make you laugh without me; would you, Grandy dear? Go away,
you are a naughty man,--go, or I shall hate you as much as that dreadful
Mr. Rugge."

"Rugge,--who is he?" said the Mayor, curiously, catching at any clew.

"Hush, my darling!--hush!" said Waife, fondling her on his breast.
"Hush! What is to be done, sir?"

Hartopp made a sly sign to him to say no more before Sophy, and then
replied, addressing himself to her, "What is to be done? Nothing shall
be done, my dear child, that you dislike. I don't wish to part you two.
Don't hate me; lie down again; that's a dear. There, I have smoothed
your pillow for you. Oh, here's your pretty doll again." Sophy snatched
at the doll petulantly, and made what the French call a moue at the good
man as she suffered her grandfather to replace her on the sofa.

"She has a strong temper of her own," muttered the Mayor; "so has Anna
Maria a strong temper!"

Now, if I were anyway master of my own pen, and could write as I
pleased, without being hurried along helter-skelter by the tyrannical
exactions of that "young Rapid" in buskins and chiton called "THE
HISTORIC MUSE," I would break off this chapter, open my window, rest my
eyes on the green lawn without, and indulge in a rhapsodical digression
upon that beautifier of the moral life which is called "Good Temper."
Ha! the Historic Mu