yours, dear papa," said Nelly, smiling. "Don't disavow
your own teaching."

"Well, the more fool me. I know better now. But what's the use of it?
When the prospect of a little ease and comfort was offered to me, you
persuaded me to refuse it. Ay, that you did! You began with the old
story about our happy hearth and contentment; and where is it now?"

A sob, so low as to be scarcely heard, broke from Nelly, and she pressed
her hand to her heart with a convulsive force.

"Can you deny it? You made me reject the only piece of kindness ever was
shown me in a life long. There was the opportunity of spending the rest
of my days in peace, and you wouldn't let me take it. And the fool I was
to listen to you!"

"Oh, papa, how you wrong her!" cried Kate, as, in a torrent of tears,
she bent over his chair. "Dearest Nelly has no thought but for us. Her
whole heart is our own."

"If you could but see it!" cried Nelly, with a thick utterance.

"'T is a droll way of showing affection, then," said Dal ton, "to keep
me a beggar, and you no better than a servant-maid. It's little matter
about me, I know. I'm old, and worn out, a reduced Irish gentleman, with
nothing but his good blood remaining to him. But you, Kate, that are
young and handsome, ay, faith! a deal sight better-looking than my Lady
herself, it's a little hard that you are to be denied what might be your
whole fortune in life."

"You surely would not stake all her happiness on the venture, papa?"
said Nelly, mildly.

"Happiness!" said he, scornfully; "what do you call happiness? Is it
dragging out life in poverty like this, with the proudest friend in our
list an old toy-maker?"

"Poor Hanserl!" murmured Nelly, in a low voice; but soft as were the
accents, the dwarf heard them, and nodded his head twice, as though to
thank her for a recognition of whose import he knew nothing.

"Just so! You have pity enough for strangers, but none for your own
people," said Dalton, as he arose and paced the room, the very act of
motion serving to increase his anger. "He was never used to better; he's
just what he always was. But think of me! think of the expectations I
was reared to, the place I used to hold, and see me now!"

"Dearest, best papa, do not say those bitter words," cried Kate,
passionately. "Our own dear Nelly loves us truly. What has her life been
but self-denial?"

"And have I not had my share of self-denial?" said he, abruptly. "Is
there left a single one of