until she almost lost her balance, little Lady
Mary carried the whole brood to the other end
of the orchard. Then, it was impossible to say
which was the happier, the proud little mother,
or the eager busy chirping little chicks.

As for Madam Juno, she remained stunned and
mystified for some time. At last, feeling little
timid soft things creeping under her, she obeyed
her instincts, and squatted over them. Then
she and her newly-acquired children all had a
good doze; and to this minute it is mine and
it is Judith's belief that she does not know
her children were ever changed.

HALF A MILLION OF MONEY
BY THE AUTHOR OF "BARBARA'S HISTORY"
CHAPTER XC.  AT FAULT.

UP and down, up and down, till his eyes
wearied of the shipping and his feet of the pavé,
Saxon wandered along the quays of the grand
old city of Bordeaux, seeking vainly for any
definite news of the Daughter of Ocean.
He had lost much precious time by the way—a
night in Bristol, a day in London, another night
in Bordeaux; but for this there had been
absolutely no help. The early train that took him
from Bristol to London arrived too late for the
morning mail to Paris, and the express from
Paris to Bordeaux brought him into the antique
capital of Guienne between ten and eleven at
night. Armed, however, with the same strong
will that had carried him along thus far, Saxon
set to work to pursue his search as vigorously
in Bordeaux as in London and Bristol, and, if
possible, to make up for lost time by even greater
perseverance and patience.

Up to this point he had held no further
communication with Greatorex. He was determined
to act for himself and by himself, without help or
counsel. He would, perhaps, have found it difficult
to explain why he shrunk from sharing the
responsibility of this task—why, from that moment
when he had first divined the share which Helen
Rivière might bear in his cousin's flight, he had
jealously kept the supposition to himself, and
determined to follow up this accidental clue
unaided and alone. But so it was. He felt that the
girl's name was sacred; that his lips were sealed;
that he, and he only, must seek and save her.

He thought of her perpetually. He could
think, indeed, of nothing else. Throughout the
weary, weary miles of travel, by night, by day,
sleeping or waking, the remembrance of her peril
was ever before him. He had beheld her face
but twice in his life; yet it was as vividly
present to him as if he had been familiar with its
pale aud tender beauty from his boyhood. It
wrung his very heart to think of her eyes—those
pathetic eyes, with that look of the caged chamois
in them that he remembered so well. Then he
would wonder vaguely whether they had always
worn that expression? Whether he should ever
sec them lighted up with smiles?  Whether she
had ever known the joyous, thoughtless, sunshiny
happiness of childhood, and had made her father's
home musical with laughter?

Musing thus, while the unvaried flats of central
France were gliding monotonously past the
carriage windows, he would wander on into other
and quite irrelevant speculations, wondering
whether she remembered him? Whether she
would know him again, if she met him?
Whether she had ever thought of him since that day
when they met at the Waterloo Bridge station,
and he paid her fare from Sedgebrook? And
then, at the end of all these tangled skeins of
reverie would always come the one terrible question
—did she love William Trefalden?

He told himself that it was impossible. He
told himself over and over again that heaven was
just and merciful, and would never condemn that
pure young soul to so fatal an error; but while
be reasoned, he trembled.

Supposing that this thing had really come to
pass—what then? What if they were already
married? The supposition was not to be
endured, and yet it flashed upon him every now
and then, like a sharp pang of physical pain.
He might put it aside as resolutely as he would,
but it came back and back again.

Whence this pain? Whence this anguish, this
restless energy, this indomitable will, that knew
neither fatigue, nor discouragement, nor shadow
of turning? These were questions that he never
asked himself. Had they been put to him, he
would probably have replied that he compassionated
Helen Rivière from the bottom of his heart,
aud that he would have felt the same, and done
as much, for any other innocent and helpless girl
in a similar position. It was pity. Pity, of
course. What else should it be?

In this frame of mind, devoured by anxiety,
and impelled by a restlessness that increased with
every hour, the young man traversed the
hundreds upon hundreds of miles between Bristol
and Bordeaux, and now wandered eagerly about
the far-spreading city and the endless quays,
pursuing his search.

Of the Daughter of Ocean, he ascertained
that she had arrived in port and was unlading
somewhere below the bridge. Sent hither and
thither, referred from one shipping agent to
another, and confused by all sorts of contradictory
directions, he had the greatest difficulty to find
the steamer, and, when found, to gain a moment's
hearing from those about her. Deserted,
apparently, by her captain and crew, and given over
to a swarm of blue-bloused porters, the Daughter
of Ocean lay beside a wharf on the further
side of the Garonne, undergoing a rapid clearance.
The wharf was obstructed with crates,
bales, and packing-cases; the porters came and
went like bees about a hive; a French commis
in a shaggy white hat, with a book under his arm
and a pen behind his ear, stood by and took note
of the goods as they were landed; and all was
chatter, straw, bustle, and confusion. No one
seemed able to give Saxon the least intelligence.
The commis would scarcely listen to him, and the
only person from whom he could extract a civil