"But how will you know, sir, which is the
most promising?" she asked, with her brightened
eyes roving over the view.

"Ah!" said Barbox Brothers, with another
grave smile, and considerably improving in his
ease of speech. "To be sure. In this way.
Where your father can pick up so much every
clay for a good purpose,I may once and again
pick up a little for an indifferent purpose. The
gentleman for Nowhere must become still better
known at the Junction. He shall continue to
explore it, until he attaches something that he
has seen, heard, or found out, at the head of
each of the seven roads, to the road itself. And
so his choice of a road shall be determined by his
choice among his discoveries."

Her hands still busy, she again glanced at the
prospect, as if it comprehended something that
had not been in it before, and laughed as if it
yielded her new pleasure.

"But I must not forget," said Barbox
Brothers, " (having got so far) to ask a favour.
I want your help in this expedient of mine.
I want to bring you what I pick up at the heads
of the seven roads that you lie here looking out
at, and to compare notes with you about it. May
I? They say two heads are better than one.
I should say myself that probably depends upon
the heads concerned. But I am quite sure,
though we are so newly acquainted, that your
head and your father's have found out better
things, Phoebe, than ever mine of itself discovered."

She gave him her sympathetic right hand, in
perfect rapture with his proposal, and eagerly
and gratefully thanked him.

"That's well!" said Barbox Brothers.
"Again I must not forget (having got so far)
to ask a favour. Will you shut your eyes?"

Laughing playfully at the strange nature of
the request, she did so.

"Keep them shut," said Barbox Brothers,
going softly to the door, and coming back.
"You are on your honour, mind, not to open
your eyes until I tell you that you may?"

"Yes! On my honour."

"Good. May I take your lace-pillow from
you for a minute?"

Still laughing and wondering, she removed
her hands trom it, and he put it aside.

"Tell me. Did you see the puffs of smoke
and steam made by the morning fast-train
yesterday on road number seven from here?"

"Behind the elm-trees and the spire?"

"That's the road," said Barbox Brothers,
directing his eyes towards it.

"Yes. I watched them melt away."

"Anything unusual in what they expressed?"

"No!" she answered, merrily.

"Not complimentary to me, for I was in that
train. I went—- don't open your eyes—- to
fetch you this, from the great ingenious town.
It is not half so large as your lace-pillow, and
lies easily and lightly in its place. These little
keys are like the keys of a miniature piano, and
you supply the air required with your left hand.
May you pick out delightful music from it, my
dear! For the present you—- can open your
eyes now—- good-bye!"

In his embarrassed way, he closed the door
upon himself, and only saw, in doing so, that
she ecstatically took the present to her her bosom
and caressed it. The glimpse, gladdened his
heart, and yet saddened it; for so might, she, if
her youth had flourished in its natural course,
have taken to her breast that day the slumbering
music of her own child's voice.

BARBOX BROTHERS AND CO.

With good will and earnest purpose, the
gentleman for Nowhere began, on the very next
day, his researches at the heads of the seven roads.
The results of his researches, as he and Phoebe
afterwards set them down in fair writing, hold
their due places in this veracious chronicle, from
its seventeenth page, onward. But they occupied
a much longer time in the getting together
than they ever will in the perusal. And this is
probably the case with most reading matter,
except when it is of that highly beneficial kind
(for Posterity) which is "thrown off in a few
moments of leisure " by tlie superior poetic
geniuses who scorn to take prose pains.

It must be admitted, however, that Barbox
by no means hurried himself. His heart being in
his work of good-nature, he revelled in it. There
was the joy, too (it was a true joy to him),
of sometimes sitting by, listening to Phoebe as
she picked out more and more discourse from
her musical instrument, and as her natural taste
and ear refined daily upon her first discoveries.
Besides being a pleasure, this was an occupation,
and in the course of weeks it consumed hours.
It resulted that his dreaded birthday was close
upon him before he had troubled himself any
more about it.

The matter was made more pressing by the
unforeseen circumstance that the councils held
(at which Mr. Lamps, beaming most brilliantly,
on a few rare occasions assisted) respecting the
road to be selected, were, after all, in no wise
assisted by his investigations. For, he had
connected this interest with this road, or that interest
with the other, but could deduce no reason
from, it for giving any road the preference.
Consequently, when the last council was holden,
that part of the business stood, in the end,
exactly where it had stood in the beginning.

"But, sir," remarked Phoebe, " we have
only six roads after all. Is the seventh road
dumb?"

"The seventh road? O!" said Barbox
Brothers, rubbing his chin. " That is the road
I took, you know, when I went to get your little
present. That is its story, Phoebe.''

"Would yon mind taking that road again,
.sir?" she asked with hesitation.

"Not in the least; it is a great high road
after all."

"I should like you to take it," returned
Phoebe, with a persuasive smile, "for the love
of that little present which must ever be so dear
to me. I should like you to take it, because