"Erasmus!"

"She is a pretty woman, Robert—a very
pretty woman. She is like my poor mother's
little Dresden shepherdess, that you and I fell
in love with when we were boys. I have it now.
It is a pity she will talk of what she does not
understand."

Lucky he said that, or, my goodness me, what
I should have done, I don't know. It is really
dreadful to think of feeling in such a temper.

I was tempted to wish a dozen times that
Jupiter would have a few more new moons
visible to the naked eye, or that some great
revulsion of nature would take place, or somebody
invent something astounding—anything to
attract the attention of Erasmus. But there he
was as rational almost as Robert. He examined
everything that his housekeeper brought from
Windfalls; he tasted a good many things; he
even meddled with the flowers, and stuck two
peonies on each side of the pier-glass.

Also he went home, for no particular reason
that we could made out, and if he did not bring
back, in a little basket, carefully wrapped up in
cotton, his mother's Dresden shepherdess.

"I shall be curious to see, Patty," said he,
as he placed it on a conspicuous bracket, " if
any one will perceive the likeness—if she will
notice it herself—I wish—hum, hum."

Erasmus had a way, when not quite satisfied,
or not exactly understanding his own thoughts,
of relieving his feelings by saying "hum, hum."

For my part, I hoped he would be humming
all the evening. Generally, I had to remind
him of his dress, but in the afternoon of the
tea-party, three hours before any one was
expected, he came down with even his white
tie elegantly tied.

"I got Molesworthy to do it for me," says
he, quite unashamed. To be sure, when a clever
man is a fool, what a fool he is! I hope everybody
will pardon this wicked speech, but
indeed I did not in the least know what I was
doing that evening.

My darling Pet and the excellent squire, who
was growing quite a stout portly fellow, came
early.

"How nice of you," I whispered to her—
"how nice of you, Pet, to come so beautifully
dressed."

"I think he will not know if we wear silk or
sackcloth—but I have a thought in my head—to
be clever this evening, and I made my old thing
read, oh, such a book, with a name so long.
One person shall not only be able to talk
learned to him."

Was not she a darling to enter at once into
my feelings. But oh! goodness gracious, when
she arrived—that person—really she was the
little Dresden shepherdess over again, and poor
Miss Ross looked like an overgrown school-girl
beside her, in white muslin.

However, excepting that one thing, never was
there such a successful tea-party. Everybody
was delighted with the freshness, the prettiness
of my tea-table. I flatter myself—but dear me,
what is the use of my flattering myself, when
Erasmus is sitting by, and staring at that
person just as if she were one of Jupiter's
moons, or his mother's Dresden shepherdess.

"I am so afraid of opening my lips before
you, doctor" (such dreadfully pretty lips),
murmured this false thing, who only came to
talk to him.

"Why?" said he, quite anxious. "Now
why?"

"Because you are so clever, and know so
many languages; and though I study a good deal,
and never permit myself to read the least bit of
trash—yet I feel—I know I am but a babe in
learning." And she looked up, odiously pretty.

"That we all are, my dear madam. The
more one dips into the well of knowledge, the
deeper one finds it."

"But still, how it fascinates one to penetrate
into the mysteries of nature. All that you
were telling us this morning of the origin of
races, of the different types of the human kind,
charmed me. I shall take up entomology as
one of my favourite studies."

"Entomology!" echoed Erasmus.

"Yes—I was so much interested in what you
told Miss Ross of the Tudor origin—-"

"Hum, hum," said Erasmus.

Pet and I exchanged felicitations by the eyes.

"That is a very silly woman," whispered the
squire to me; "she ought to content herself
with looking pretty."

But Sarah Jane, who was there of course at
the tea-party, loved her at once. She looked her
over, and appraised her and her dress, and
each calculation showing its costliness and
value, of course Sarah Jane loved on in
proportion. She had never seen any reason
why people should be particular in naming
their ologies, so she was as ignorant as
Mrs. Arundel as to why Erasmus hummed.
Mr. Bellenden and Sarah Jane were now
on pretty good terms. As Robert said, " She
had at last settled down to her paces all
right," which was no doubt a satisfactory
way of talking about her, as far as Robert was
concerned.

For my part, I was glad to perceive that she
was beginning to see what it was to be a wife.
She took some time to do so, which was the
more astonishing when I remember how dreadfully
she was in love with Mr. Bellenden before
they were married. However, I cannot waste
all our precious moments upon her. I must
bring our tea-drinking to an end.

We discovered that Miss Ross sang very
well, I had the satisfaction of seeing Erasmus
beating time (all wrong), but I had the pain of
witnessing his eyes fixed first on the Dresden
shepherdess and then on Mrs. Arundel.

"My goodness me," I said to myself, " how
careful mothers should be as to what they leave
in their sons' way. Don't you let little Oliver,"
I whispered to Pet, " ever see a Dresden china
shepherdess."

"My son," replied Pet, with dignity, as if
he was twenty-six years old instead of twenty-six
months, "will only admire what his