Horace, to confide his boy to the loving care of
those who could provide for him. Her counsel
prevailed over the last remnant of
perverse pride in my broken heart, and I came.
If I could but have seen my uncle—if he could
but have known how I longed for his pardon
and his love, even when I was hardest and
worst—but that consolation was not for me.
It is just."

"Anna, he loved and forgave you at the last.
I know that he dearly loved and fully forgave you.
Had he not been taken away so suddenly, he
would have shown you by his will, that——"

She laid her hand upon my lips.

"It is better so. I know that my boy and
I must owe everything to your generous hand,
and I will take your gift from you as though it
came from Heaven. I am not what I was. I
have been taught in a hard, hard school. It
is better so, Margaret, better so."

I have little to add, Lucy. By slow degrees
Anna recovered some measure of strength;
but she was never more the bright blooming
creature she had been once. While she lived, she
shared my home, and daily, hourly, made some
new return towards the old fondness which had
united us as children. The haughty spirit
sometimes rose, the wayward temper occasionally
broke forth, but never again was there any
serious breach between us. Her boy, little
Sedley—your father, Lucy—grew and thrived,
and was the joy and sunshine of our quiet home.
Stock, bedridden and very near the close of his
long life, permitted Anna's boy to climb up on
a chair to the tall old-fashioned chimney-piece
in his room, and to reach down and fill for him his
cherished pipe. Such a concession Stock never
made before. Many and many a long church-
warden was smashed by falling from the inexpert
little fingers; but Stock resented any
attempt to interfere with him.

"Let un be," he would growl out to Hester,
who had constituted herself chief nursemaid, and
was a little jealous of her authority. "Women-
folks knows nought about boys."

"Children should be obedient, Mr. Stock,"
Hester would retort, sharply.

"Ah! and so should women. Let un be.
He'll be all right, I tell ye. He's got more
sense in his little curly poll nor some as is
more'n twenty times his age. Lord, it's a marvel
to see the wisdom o' that child!"

Nor did any number of mishaps, in the filling
of a long series of pipes, shake Stock one jot in
his conviction that if the "women-folks" would
only leave Master Sedley alone, he would
infallibly come out triumphant from any
possible trial of his skill and wisdom. The
child took greatly to me. Sometimes when
he came frolicking up to me in his gleeful
way, his merry laughter and bright arch
glance would make me sad for a season.
For it was as if his father's spirit were
looking out of his blue-grey eyes. But little
Sedley, though he inherited Horace's sweet
temper and buoyant disposition, was made of
sterner stuff than his father. He had what
poor Uncle Gough used to say Horace wanted
—ballast.

You have heard of Mr. Norcliffe from your
father. He took my nephew as his pupil, and
helped to make him the clever doctor he is
now; and the pretty house where you and
your brothers and sisters were born, once
belonged to him. After my sister's death, I gave
up the Gable House, and came to be near
Sedley Lee and his young wife. When children
gathered round them, and their pleasant house
was filled with the sound of fresh young voices,
I begged to have you, my godchild, to be as a
daughter to me. Your good parents trusted
me with their treasure, and their treasure is
very dear and precious to my heart.

Anna died with her head upon my breast, and
my hand in hers. My name was the last word
upon her lips, as it had been on the lips of him
whom we both loved so well.

From my chamber window that looks on the
sea, I sit and watch the restless striving waves,
that rise and fall, and fall and rise again. With
very different eyes do I look upon them now,
from those of that poor love-lorn girl who saw
them through her tears near fifty years ago.
The waves toss and leap wildly; but the heart
that once beat more wildly than they, is at
peace. I look out at the sunset, and think with
a thankful spirit that my life is setting, serene
and bright, even as the daylight dies brightly in
the west. I await the summons to depart, not
impatiently—for life has many sweet moments
for me—but with hope. The remembrances of
my early life, its scenes, persons, and incidents,
become, not less but more clear to me as I
grow old. And sometimes it is with me, as the
German poet has said: "The present and near
seem afar off, and that which has disappeared
becomes the only reality."

THE END.

WATERLOO AND THE WORKHOUSE.

THE following memoir was not actually
written down on paper with pen and ink by the
narrator himself, but it is a transcript of notes
made during the old man's narration, and is
in truth what it professes to be:—the real
uninterpolated history of a genuine soldier of the
18th of June, '15, given as nearly as possible in
the veteran's own vernacular.

THE RECRUIT.

I was born at Stonesfield, in 1792. My father
was a slate-digger. My mother died when I
was between three and four years old. That was
a bad job o' my side. My mother's father took
care of me, on account of my mother's death,
to help my father. Father married a second
and a third time, and had a family each time.
He fetched me away from gran'father when I
was 'twixt six and seven. I first recollect
myself about seven at school at Stonesfield. We was