anything with the governor; to question the wisdom of any one of his edicts, is to reduce his conversation to a highly animated monologue of one. As he often says, "Let any one dare to cross me, or say this, that, or the other, to my face, there shan't be a bit of him left in two minutes!"
Now, though I can easily imagine him reducing any one to the condition of body that he mentions, it has always puzzled me as to what he would do with the remains; it certainly opens out a vast field of conjecture.
He gets up for some more tobacco, and, turning his back upon us, we perceive that a very ornamental antimacassar has caught in the buttons of his coat, and is dangling elegantly at his heels. It is quite out of the question to tell him it is there, equally out of the question to relieve him of it, so he will carry it to bed with him, and, on discovering it, will cast his mind backwards to try and remember whether, during the evening, we showed any signs of unusual levity.
Why am I noting, even smiling at, all these trifles, when brain and heart and mind are aching and tense with the consciousness of a great fact? I thrust it away from me—I will not think of it—I shall be alone by-and-by, then I will look it in the face.
"The Tempests return next week," says papa, with a grateful change of the subject. "What the old man can be thinking about to race about the world as he does———" Here he pauses expressively.
"Do you hear, Dolly?" I say to her. "George is coming back! Are you not glad?"
"Very," says Dolly.
As I look at her pretty blooming face a happy thought strikes me. Why should not she and George make a match? She always liked him, and he would suit her far better than he ever would
