husband's leave, something should be done for Grace. Would it not be a good work? and was it not incumbent on her to make some kindly use of all the goods with which Providence had blessed herself?
And then they went back to the sitting-room, each again with a young child in her arms, Mrs. Crawley having stowed away in the kitchen the chicken broth, and the leg of pork, and the supply of eggs. Lucy had been engaged the while with the children; and when the two married ladies entered, they found that a shop had been opened at which all manner of luxuries were being readily sold and purchased at marvelously easy prices; the guava jelly was there, and the oranges, and the sugar-plums, red, and yellow, and striped; and, moreover, the gingerbread had been taken down in the audacity of their commercial speculations, and the nuts were spread out upon a board, behind which Lucy stood as shop-girl, disposing of them for kisses.
"Mamma, mamma," said Bobby, running up to his mother, "you must buy something of her," and he pointed with his fingers at the shop-girl. "You must give her two kisses for that heap of barley-sugar." Looking at Bobby's mouth at the time, one would have said that his kisses might be dispensed with.
When they were again in the pony carriage, behind the impatient Puck, and were well away from the door, Fanny was the first to speak.
"How very different those two are," she said—"different in their minds and in their spirit."
"But how much higher toned is her mind than his! How weak he is in many things, and how strong she is in every thing! How false is his pride, and how false his shame!"
"But we must remember what he has to bear. It is not every one that can endure such a life as his without false pride and false shame."
"But she has neither," said Lucy.
"Because you have one hero in a family, does that give you a right to expect another?" said Mrs. Robarts. "Of all my own acquaintance, Mrs. Crawley, I think, comes nearest to heroism."
And then they passed by the Hogglestock school, and Mr. Crawley, when he heard the noise of the wheels, came out.
