we recommend that she should visit
Manchester Street, look at the house, and
talk all its arrangements over with the Mrs.
Lomas, who, as matron, watches on the spot
over the beginnings of the scheme. She will
find this matron herself to be young and
cheerful, and in earnest with the wish to be
of use. She is one who has paid many a
friendly visit to day-workers in their garrets,
for the purpose of explaining to them what it
is so much for their own comfort to understand.

When this house is full, it will belong fairly
to the day-workers themselves; and there
are no rules but such as they would, with
a regard to the economy of their funds,
and to their personal respectability, make for
their own following. Though few return from
duties until nine in the evening the sitting-
room fire, in winter-time, is lighted at six
o'clock and it is kept alight all day on
Sunday; so that the apartment is always
warm and comfortable when the inmates use
it. At eleven at night it is put out; and any
inmate staying out of the house after eleven
must give a reason for so doing. A
respectable reference is necessarily required
with each new-comer (if only to her own
employer), and there are no other customs
that are not to be found usual in any other
private household. The girls buy what they
please, and cook it how and when they please
for themselves, at their kitchen ranges. If any
or all of them like to associate their funds
for common meals, it is for them to say and
do what they desire.

At Manchester Street, it should be added,
there is a free singing-class, and there are
evenings of music. Opportunities of self-
improvement are also supplied by the warm-
hearted promoters of the scheme. But in all
this the sole desire is, to give a kindly and a
hearty lift at starting, to a way—into which
those whom it concerns may soon get for
themselves—of extracting all the happiness,
security, and comfort in their power out of
scanty incomes.

        TWO COLLEGE FRIENDS.

     IN FOUR CHAPTERS.    CHAPTER I.

IN the year seventeen hundred and seventy
three, two young men took possession of the
only habitable rooms of the old tumble-down
rectory-house of Combe-Warleigh, in one of
the wildest parts of one of the western counties,
then chiefly notable for miles upon miles
of totally uncultivated moor and hill. The
rooms were not many; consisting only of two
wretched litle bed-chambers and a parlour of
diminutive size. A small building which
leaned against the outer wall served as a
kitchen to the establishment; and the cook,
an old woman of sixty years of age, retired
every night to a cottage about a quarter of a
mile from the parsonage, where she had
occupied a garret for many years. The house
had originally been built of lath and plaster,
and in some places revealed the skeleton
walls where the weather had peeled off the
outer coating, and given the building an
appearance of ruin, and desolation which,
comported with the bleakness of the
surrounding scenery. With the exception of the
already-named cottage and a small collection
of huts around the deserted mansion of the
landlord of the estate, there were no houses
in the parish. How it had ever come to the
honour of possessing a church and rectory no-
one could discover; for there were no records
or traditions of its ever having been more
wealthy or populous than it then was;—but
it was in fact only nominally a parish, for no
clergyman had been resident for a hundred
years; the living was held by the fortunate
possessor of a vicarage about fifteen miles to
the north, and with the tithes of the united
cures made up a stately income of nearly
ninety pounds a-year. No wonder there were
no repairs on the rectory—nor frequent visits
to his parishioners. It was only on the first
Sunday of each month he rode over from his
dwelling-place and read the service to the
few persons who happened to remember it was
the Sabbath, or understood the invitation
conveyed to them by the one broken bell swayed
to and fro by the drunken shoemaker (who
also officiated as clerk) the moment he saw
the parson's shovel hat appear on the ascent
of the Vaird hill. And great accordingly
was the surprise of the population; and
pleased the heart of the rector, when two
young gentlemen from Oxford hired the
apartments I have described—fitted them up
with a cart load of furniture from Hawsleigh,
and gave out that they were going to spend
the long vacation in that quiet neighbourhood
for the convenience of study. Nor did their
conduct belie their statement. Their table
was covered with books and maps, and
dictionaries; and after their frugal breakfast,
the whole day was devoted to reading. Two
handsome intelligent looking young men as
ever you saw—both about the same age and
height; with a contrast both in look and
disposition that probably formed the first link
in the close friendship that existed between
them.

Arthur Hayning, a month or two the
senior, was of a more self relying nature and
firmer character than the other. In uninterrupted
effort he pursued his work, never
looking up, never making a remark, seldom
even answering a stray observation of his
friend. But when the hour assigned for the
close of his studies had arrived, a change
took place in his manner. He was gayer,
more active and enquiring than his volatile
companion. The books were packed away, the
writing-desk locked up; with a stout stick in
his hand, a strong hammer in his pocket, and
a canvas bag slung over his shoulders, he
started off on an exploring expedition among
the neighbouring hills; while Winnington