Towards mid-day, I went down stairs to
attend to some of my regular duties. An hour
afterwards, on my way back to the sick-room, I
saw the Count (who had gone out again early,
for the third time), entering the hall, to all
appearance in the highest good spirits. Sir
Percival, at the same moment, put his head out of
the library-door, and addressed his noble friend,
with extreme eagerness, in these words:

"Have you found her?"

His lordship's large face became dimpled all
over with placid smiles; but he made no reply
in words. At the same time, Sir Percival turned
his head, observed that I was approaching the
stairs, and looked at me in the most rudely angry
manner possible.

"Come in here and tell me about it," he said,
to the Count. "Whenever there are women in
a house, they're always sure to be going up or
down stairs."

"My dear Percival," observed his lordship,
kindly, "Mrs. Michelson has duties. Pray
recognise her admirable performance of them as
sincerely as I do! How is the sufferer, Mrs.
Michelson?"

"No better, my lord, I regret to say."

"Sad— most sad!" remarked the Count. "You
look fatigued, Mrs. Michelson. It is certainly
time you and my wife had some help in nursing.
I think I may be the means of offering you that
help. Circumstances have happened which wil.
oblige Madame Fosco to travel to London, either
to-morrow or the day after. She will go away
in the morning, and return at night; and she
will bring back with her, to relieve you, a nurse
of excellent conduct and capacity, who is now
disengaged. The woman is known to my wife
as a person to be trusted. Before she comes
here, say nothing about her, if you please, to
the doctor, because he will look with an evil eye
on any nurse of my providing. When she
appears in this house, she will speak for herself;
and Mr. Dawson will be obliged to acknowledge
that there is no excuse for not employing her.
Lady Glyde will say the same. Pray present
my best respects and sympathies to Lady
Glyde."

I expressed my grateful acknowledgments for
his lordship's kind considerations. Sir Percival
cut them short by calling to his noble friend
(using, I regret to say, a profane expression
to come into the library, and not to keep him
waiting there any longer.

I proceeded upstairs. We are poor erring
creatures; and however well established a woman's
principles may be, she cannot always keep
on her guard against the temptation to exercise
an idle curiosity. I am ashamed to say that a
idle curiosity, on this occasion, got the better of
my principles, and made me unduly inquisitive
about the question which Sir Percival had
addressed to his noble friend, at the library door.
Who was the Count expected to find, in the
course of his studious morning rambles at
Blackwater Park? A woman, it was to be presumed
from the terms of Sir Percival's inquiry. I did
not suspect the Count of any impropriety — I
knew his moral character too well. The only

question I asked myself was— Had he found
her?

——————————————————

VERY COMMON LAW.

IT would be an inexcusable omission on our
part were we to conclude our gossip on shopping
law without alluding to sale in open market, or,
as the books have it, "market overt."

Not quite so particular as our Saxon
ancestors in this respect, who prohibited the sale of
anything of greater value than twenty-pence
unless in market overt, and, moreover, directed
every bargain and sale to be contracted in the
presence of credible witnesses, we still continue
to assign certain privileges to this species of
barter. As thus: If my goods are stolen and
old out of market overt, I may retake them
wherever I may be fortunate enough to find
them; but if they are sold in market overt, the
purchaser may hold them in spite of me. Not
but what the significance of the term, however,
is somewhat larger in our day than it was in the
days we speak of; for although in the country
"market overt" still continues to bear the old
interpretation, and signifies a sale upon a market
day and in the market-place only, yet in London
every day, except Sunday, is esteemed by the
law to be a market day, and every shop (except
a pawnbroker's) to be a market overt.

Pawnbrokers are treated to a special law of
their own, and "the sale of any goods," our
readers may be pleased to hear, "wrongfully
taken to a pawnbroker's in London, or within
two miles thereof, shall not alter the property,
for this being generally a clandestine trade, is,
therefore, made an exception to the general
rule."

There is another exception, by the way,
which may interest the horse-dealing fraternity,
although disclosing that the law has occasionally
treated them with a curious suspicion. So
long ago as the reign of Philip and Mary the
Legislature were compelled to interfere with
the horse-dealers of the period, but, as we find
from the preamble to a statute passed in the
subsequent Parliament of Elizabeth, with but
indifferent success. "Whereas," says that enactment
(and our readers will please to observe
how wonderfully perspicuous is the language of
the act), "through most counties of this realm
horse-stealing is grown so common, as neither in
pastures or closes, nor hardly in stables, the same
are to be in safety from stealing, which ensueth
by the ready buying of the same by horse
coursers and others in some open fairs or markets
far distant from the owner, and with such
speed as the owner cannot, by pursuit, possibly
help the same, and sundry good ordinances have
heretofore," &c. &c. &c. The effect of this
act was— and its provisions continue in force to
the present day— that "no purchaser should gain
a good property in a stolen horse unless it had
been bought in open market after having been
exposed for one whole hour, between ten A.M.
and sunset, in the public place used for such