ey ponies! she is so fond of long-tailed grey ponies. Poor child!
when shall I be able to give her a carriage? Perhaps some day--who
knows!"

He turned the conversation, and began telling me about the cloth
mill--his old place of resort; which he had been over once again when
they were at Rose Cottage.

"And do you know, while I was looking at the machinery, a notion came
into my head that, instead of that great water-wheel--you remember
it?--it might be worked by steam."

"What sort of steam?"

"Phineas, your memory is no better, I see. Have you forgotten my
telling you how, last year, some Scotch engineer tried to move boats by
steam, on the Forth and Clyde canal? Why should not the same power be
turned to account in a cloth-mill? I know it could--I have got the
plan of the machinery in my head already. I made a drawing of it last
night, and showed it to Ursula; SHE understood it directly."

I smiled.

"And I do believe, by common patience and skill, a man might make his
fortune with it at those Enderley cloth-mills."

"Suppose you try!" I said in half jest, and was surprised to see how
seriously John took it.

"I wish I could try--if it were only practicable. Once or twice I have
thought it might be. The mill belongs to Lord Luxmore. His steward
works it. Now, if one could get to be a foreman or overseer--"

"Try--you can do anything you try."

"No, I must not think of it--she and I have agreed that I must not,"
said he, steadily. "It's my weakness--my hobby, you know. But--no
hobbies now. Above all, I must not, for a mere fancy, give up the work
that lies under my hand. What of the tan-yard, Phineas?"

"My father missed you, and grumbled after you a good deal. He looks
anxious, I think. He vexes himself more than he needs about business."

"Don't let him. Keep him as much at home as you can. I'll manage the
tan-yard: you know--and he knows too--that everything which can be
done for us all I shall do."

I looked up, surprised at the extreme earnestness of his manner.

"Surely, John--"

"Nay, there is nothing to be uneasy about--nothing more than there has
been for this year past. All trade is bad just now. Never fear, we'll
weather the storm--I'm not afraid."

Cheerfully as he spoke, I began to guess--what he already must have
known--that our fortunes were as a slowly leaking ship, of which the
helm had slipped from my old father's feeble hand. But John had taken
it--John st