rang for Flobbins, and invented some little
jobs for her, to keep her in the room. After
my breakfast vas cleared away, I sat in the
same place with my glasses on, moving my
head, now so, and now so, trying whether,
with the shining of my fire and the flaws in
the window-glass, I could re-produce any
sparkle seeming to be up there, that was like
the sparkle of an eye. But no; I could make
nothing like it. I could make ripples and
crooked lines in the front of the House to
Let, and I could even twist one window up
and loop it into another; but, I could make
no eye, nor anything like an eye. So I con-
vinced myself that I really had seen an eye.

Well, to be sure I could not get rid of the
impression of this eye, and it troubled me
and troubled me, until it was almost a
torment. I don't think I was previously
inclined to concern my head much about
the opposite House; but, after this eye, my
head was full of the house; and I thought
of little else than the house, and I watched
the house, and I talked about the house, and
I dreamed of the house. In all this, I fully
believe now, there was a good Providence.
But, you will judge for yourself about that,
bye-and-bye.

My landlord was a butler, who had married
a cook, and set up housekeeping. They had
not kept house longer than a couple of years,
and they knew no more about the House to
Let than I did. Neither could I find out
anything concerning it among the trades-
people or otherwise; further than what
Trottle had told me at first. It had been
empty, some said six years, some said eight,
some said ten. It never did let, they all
agreed, and it never would let.

I soon felt convinced that I should work
myself into one of my states about the House;
and I soon did. I lived for a whole month
in a flurry, that was always getting worse.
Towers's prescriptions, which I had brought
to London with me, were of no more use
than nothing. In the cold winter sunlight,
in the thick winter fog, in the black winter
rain, in the white winter snow, the House
was equally on my mind. I have heard, as
everybody else has, of a spirit's haunting a
house; but I have had my own personal
experience of a house's haunting a spirit; for
that House haunted mine.

In all that month's time, I never saw anyone
go into the House nor come out of the
House. I supposed that such a thing must
take place sometimes, in the dead of .the
night, or the glimmer of the morning; but, I
never saw it done. I got no relief from
having my curtains drawn when it came on
dark, and shutting out the house. The Eye
then began to shine in my fire.

I am a single old woman. I should say
at once, without being at all afraid of the
name, I am an old maid; only that I am older
than the phrase would express. The time
was when I had my love-trouble, but, it is
long and long ago. He was killed at sea
(Dear Heaven rest his blessed head!) when
I was twenty-five. I have all my life, since
ever I can remember, been deeply fond of
children. I have always felt such a love for
them, that I have had my sorrowful and
sinful times when I have fancied something
must have gone wrong in my life—something
must have been turned aside from its original
intention I mean—or I should have been the
proud and happy mother of many children,
and a fond old grandmother this day. I have
soon known better in the cheerfulness and
contentment that God has blessed me with
and given me abundant reason for; and yet
I have had to dry my eyes even then, when I
have thought of my dear, brave, hopeful, hand-
some, bright-eyed Charley, and the trust he
meant to cheer me with. Charley was my
youngest brother, and he went to India.
He married there, and sent his gentle little
wife home to me to be confined, and she was
to go back to him, and the baby was to be
left with me, and I was to bring it up. It
never belonged to this life. It took its silent
place among the other incidents in my story
that might have been, but never were. I had
hardly time to whisper to her " Dead my
own!" or she to answer, "Ashes to ashes,
dust to dust! O lay it on my breast and com-
fort Charley! " when she had gone to seek
her baby at Our Savioiur's feet. I went to
Charley, and I told him there was nothing
left but me, poor me; and I lived with Charley,
out there, several years. He was a man of
fifty, when he fell asleep in my arms. His
face had changed to be almost old and a little
stern; but, it softened, and softened when I
laid it down that I might cry and pray beside
it; and, when I looked at it for the last time,
it was my dear, untroubled, handsome, youthful
Charley of long ago.

—I was going on to tell that the loneliness
of the House to Let brought back all these
recollections, and that they had quite pierced
my heart one evening, when Flobbins, opening
the door, and looking very much as if she
wanted to laugh but thought better of it,
said:

"Mr. Jabez Jarber, ma'am!"

Upon which Mr. Jarber ambled in, in his
usual absurd way, saying:

"Sophonisba!"

Which I am obliged to confess is my name.
A pretty one and proper one enough when it
was given to me: but, a good many years out
of date now, and always sounding particularly
high-flown and comical from his lips. So I
said, sharply:

"Though it is Sophonisba, Jarber, you are
not obliged to mention it, that I see."

In reply to this observation, the ridiculous
man put the tips of my five right-hand fingers
to his lips, and said again, with an
aggravating accent on the third syllable:

"Sophomisba!"

I don't burn lamps, because I can't abide