always soft, when she tripped into her grandfather's dressing-room to make her daily enquiries. To day, her manner was more than usually subdued.
"I expect my little girl," said Mr. Dacre, "will learn a great deal from her cousins. Mrs. Harcourt, my daughter, tells me they are uncommonly forward in their education."
"Pray," said our heroine, "do tell me what is meant by a Hottentot."
"They are a peculiarly hideous and brutal race of savages in Africa."
Poor Mabel asked no farther questions. Mrs. Harcourt now arrived to breakfast with her father. The young ladies had taken their's an hour before, but just came in to wish Mr. Dacre good morning, and then departed. Mabel looked after them, and felt as if she had no right to her usual place. "Is it possible," exclaimed Mrs. Harcourt, "that you suffer Miss Dacre to have chocolate for breakfast? It is what I would not allow one of my own children to touch." To be called, "Miss Dacre," to be eating what her visiters would not be allowed to partake!—She could not swallow another spoonful. Chocolate was no indulgence to her, at all events, to-
