Phoebe, Junior

himself how the things he ordered were to be paid for, and, as so often happened, followed up that first tampering with the rules of right and wrong by a general recklessness of the most dangerous kind. He was not so much alone as he had been; his house, in which he was infinitely more amiable than of old, had become more pleasant to him; he liked his life better. His son was independent with an income of his own, and therefore he felt much more respect for him, and treated him as a companion. His daughter had developed, if not in the way of entrées, a talent for dinners which raised her very much in his eyes; and naturally the regard shown to her by the visitors reacted upon Mr. May, though it had not crossed his mind as yet that anyone could be in love with Ursula. All this made him happier in spite of himself. When you begin to esteem and be proud of your children your life is naturally happier than when you scoff and jeer at them, and treat them as creatures of inferior mould to yourself. Mr. May found out all at once that Reginald was a fine young fellow, that Ursula was pretty and pleasant, and that droll Janey, with her elf-locks and angles, was amusing at least, if no more. As for the little ones, they were considerably thrust into a corner when the elder youth forced itself into the front. They learned their lessons in corners, and had their tea by themselves, and were much humbled and subdued from the moment in which their schoolbooks and toys had meandered over the whole house, and their looks and likings had been just as important as anything else. When there is no mother to protect them, the elder sister’s first lover marks a terribly critical period for the children of the house. They were banished from the drawing-room, except on special occasions, when they came en grande tenue, in their best things, and were jeered at by Mr. Copperhead. He called them “the kids,” both Amy and Robin were aware, and they resented it unspeakably. Thus the inward happiness of the Mays confined itself to the upper regions of the family. Even Betsy regretted the days when, if she had more to do, she had at least “her kitchen to herself,” and nobody to share the credit. There was more fuss and more worry, if a trifle less labour, and the increase in consequence which resulted from being called cook, instead of maid-of-all-work, was scarcely so sweet in possession as had seemed in prospect.

“Them late dinners” were the object of her perpetual railings; “oh, how much more comfortable it was, if gentry would but think so, to have your dinner at two, and get done with your washing up before you was cleaned, or had any occasion to bother yourself about your cap!” When little Amy cried over the loneliness of “the children’s tea,” which they frequently had to pour out for themselves, Betty gave her a cake and a kiss, and felt disposed to cry too.

“And she don’t know, poor child, not the half,” said Betty, which was a kind of oracular sentence difficult for Betty herself to understand. The children had nothing to do with the late dinner; they were sent to bed earlier than they used to be, and scolded if any distant sounds of romps made itself audible at seven o’clock when their elders were dining; and then when the little ones went injured to bed, and Johnnie, indignant, worked at his lessons by himself in a corner of the old nursery, deeply aware that his schoolboy boots and jacket were quite unfit for the drawing-room, the grown-up young people ran lightly upstairs, all smiles and pleasure, and those delightful evenings began.

The children sometimes could not get to sleep for the piano and the raspings of the fiddle, which sounds of mirth suggested nothing but the wildest enjoyment to them; and when the door opened now and then, bursts of laughter and mingling voices would come out like the sounds the Peri heard at the gates of Paradise. The elder ones were happy; their little atoms of individual life had all united for the moment into one sunshiny and broad foundation, on which everything seemed to rest with that strange sense of stability and continuance, which such a moment of happiness, though it carries every element of change in it, almost invariably brings. It felt as if it might go on forever, and yet the very sentiment that inspired it made separation and convulsion inevitable⁠—one of those strange paradoxes which occur every day.

Thus the year crept round, and winter melted away with all its amusements, and spring began. Mr. Northcote’s time at Salem Chapel was more than half over, a fact on which the congregation congratulated itself much.

“If so be as he had a settled charge of his own, I shouldn’t be sorry to see him gone tomorrow,” said one of the recent members.

“Settled charge! You take my word,” said Mrs. Pigeon, who was getting old, but always continued a woman of spirit, “he’ll never have a settled charge in our connection. He carries on here, ’cause he can’t help hisself, but he ain’t cut out for a pastor, and he’s a deal too thick with them Church folks. A parson, too! I’d ’a thought he had more pride.”

“Nay, now, but I don’t wish him no harm,” said the first speaker; “he’s a civil spoken gentleman if he ain’t so free and so pleasant as a body looks for.”

“Civil spoken!” said the other; “one of our own ministers in our own connection! Bless you! they’re our servants, that’s what they are. I’d like to see one on ’em as ’ud take upon him to be civil spoken to me.”

“Well, I wouldn’t go as far as that,” cried Mrs. Brown; “we pays ’em their salary, and we ’as