morning, there were my eggs all shattered
and splashed, making an ugly yellow pool in
the road just in front of the cottage. I had
meant to have followed it up by a chicken or
so; but I saw now that it would never do.
Miss Phillis came now and then to call on us;
she was a little more high and distant than
she had been when a girl, and we felt we must
keep our place. I suppose we had affronted
the young Squire, for he never came near our
house.

Well! there came a hard winter, and
provisions rose; and Ethelinda and I had much
ado to make ends meet. If it had not been
for my sister's good management, we should
have been in debt I know; but she proposed
that we should go without dinner, and only
have a breakfast and a tea, to which I agreed,
you may be sure.

One baking day I had made some cakes
for tea—potato-cakes we called them. They
had a savoury hot smell about them; and,
to tempt Ethelinda, who was not quite well,
I cooked a rasher of bacon. Just as we were
sitting down Miss Phillis knocked at our door.
We let her in. God only knows how white
and haggard she looked. The heat of our
kitchen made her totter, and for a while she
could not speak. But all the time she looked
at the food on the table as if she feared to
shut her eyes lest it should all vanish away.
It was an eager stare like that of some
animal, poor soul! "If I durst," said Ethelinda,
wishing to ask her to share our meal,
but being afraid to speak out. I did not speak,
but handed her the good hot buttered cake;
on which she seized, and putting it up to her
lips as if to taste it, she fell back in her chair,
crying.

We had never seen a Morton cry before;
and it was something awful. We stood silent
and aghast. She recovered herself, but did
not taste the food; on the contrary, she
covered it up with both her hands, as if afraid
of losing it. "If you'll allow me," said she in
a stately kind of way to make up for our
having seen her crying, "I'll take it to my
nephew." And she got up to go away; but
she could hardly stand for very weakness,
and had to sit down again; she smiled at us,
and said she was a little dizzy, but it would
soon go off; but as she smiled, the bloodless
lips were drawn far back over her teeth,
making her face seem somehow like a death's
head. "Miss Morton," said I, "do honour
us by taking tea with us this once. The
Squire, your father, once took a luncheon
with my father, and we are proud of it to
this day." I poured her out some tea, which
she drank; the food she shrank away from
as if the very sight of it turned her sick
again. But when she rose to go she looked
at it with her sad wolfish eyes, as if she could
not leave it; and at last she broke into a low
cry and said, "Oh, Bridget, we are starving!
we are starving for want of food! I can bear
it; I don't mind; but he suffers, oh, how
he suffers! Let me take him food for this
one night."

We could hardly speak; our hearts were
in our throats, and the tears ran down our
cheeks like rain. We packed up a basket,
and carried it to her very door, never
venturing to speak a word, for we knew what
it must have cost her to say that. When
we left her at the cottage we made her our
usual deep courtesy, but she fell upon our
necks, and kissed us. For several nights
after she hovered round our house about
dusk; but she would never come in again,
and face us in candle and fire-light, much less
meet us by daylight. We took our food to
her as regularly as might be, and gave it to
her in silence, and with the deepest courtesies
we could make, we felt so honoured. We had
many plans now she had permitted us to
know of her distress. We hoped she would
allow us to go on serving her in some way
as became us as Sidebothams. But one night,
she never came; we staid out in the cold
bleak wind looking into the dark for her
thin worn figure; all in vain. Late the next
afternoon the young Squire lifted the latch,
and stood right in the middle of our house-
place. The roof was low overhead; and
made lower by the deep beams supporting
the floor above; he stooped as he looked at
us, and tried to form words, but no sound
came out of his lips. I never saw such
gaunt woe; no, never! At last he took me
by the shoulder, and led me out of the house.

"Come with me!" he said, when we were
in the open air, as if that gave him strength
to speak audibly. I needed no second word.
We entered Miss Phillis's cottage; a liberty
I had never taken before. What little furniture
was there it was clear to be seen were
cast-off fragments of the old splendour of
Morton Hall. No fire. Grey wood ashes
lay on the hearth. An old settee, once white
and gold, now doubly shabby in its fall from
its former estate. On it lay Miss Phillis,
very pale; very still; her eyes shut.

"Tell me!" he gasped. "Is she dead?"
I think she is asleep; but she looks so strange
—as if she might be—" He could not say
the awful word again. I stooped and felt
no warmth; only a cold chill atmosphere
seemed to surround her.

"She is dead!" I replied at length. "Oh,
Miss Phillis! Miss Phillis!" and, like a
fool, I began to cry. But he sate down
without a tear, and looked vacantly at the
empty hearth. I dared not cry any more
when I saw him so stony sad. I did not
know what to do. I could not leave him;
and yet I had no excuse for staying. I went
up to Miss Phillis, and softly arranged the
grey ragged locks about her face.

"Aye!" said he. "She must be laid out.
Who so fit to do it as you and your sister,
children of good old Robert Sidebotham."

"Oh! my master," I said, "this is no fit
place for you. Let me fetch my sister to sit