who asked me if he might "tak' a bit o' bread to the old wench at home?"

John, hearing, turned, and for the first time noticed me. Phineas, it was very wrong of you; but there is no danger

66

now."

No, there was none,

- not even for Abel Fletcher's son. I

stood safe by John's side, very happy, very proud.

"Well, my men," he said, looking round with a smile, "have

you had enough to eat?"

"Oh, ay!" they all cried.

And one man added, "Thank the Lord!" "That's right, Jacob Baines. And another time, trust the Lord. You wouldn't then have been abroad this summer morning" - and he pointed to the dawn just reddening in the sky"this quiet, blessed summer morning, burning and rioting, bringing yourselves to the gallows, and your children to starvation."

"They be nigh that a'ready," said Jacob, sullenly. "Us men ha' gotten a meal, thankee for it; but what'll become o' the little 'uns at home? I say, Mr. Halifax," and he seemed waxing desperate again, "we must get food somehow."

John turned away, his countenance very sad. Another of the men plucked at him from behind.

"Sir, when thee was a poor lad, I lent thee a rug to sleep on; I doan't grudge 'ee getting on; you was born for a gentleman, sure-ly. But Master Fletcher be a hard man."

"And a just one," persisted John. "You that work for him, did he ever stint you of a halfpenny? If you had come to him and said, Master, times are hard, we can't live upon our wages,' he might I don't say that he would but he might even have given you the food you tried to steal."

"D'ye think he'd give it us now?" and Jacob Baines, the big, gaunt, savage fellow, who had been the ringleader, the same, too, who had spoken of his "little 'uns,' came and looked steadily in John's face.

"I knew thee as a lad; thee'rt a young man now, as will be a father some o' these days. Oh! Mr. Halifax, may'ee ne'er want a meal o' good meat for the missus and the babbies at home, if ee'll get a bit o' bread for our'n this day."

"My man, I'll try.

99

He called me aside, explained to me, and asked my advice and consent, as Abel Fletcher's son, to a plan that had come

into his mind. It was to write orders, which each man presenting at our mill should receive a certain amount of flour. "Do you think your father would agree?"

"I think he would."

"Yes," John added, pondering. "I am sure he would. And besides, if he does not give some, he may lose all. But he would not do it for fear of that. No, he is a just man I am not afraid. Give me some paper, Jael."

He sat down as composedly as if he had been alone in the counting house, and wrote. I looked over his shoulder, admiring his clear, firm handwriting, the precision, concentrativeness, and quickness with which he first seemed to arrange and then execute his ideas. He possessed to the full that "business" faculty so frequently despised, but which, out of very ordinary material, often makes a clever man, and without which the cleverest man alive can never be altogether a great

man.

When about to sign the orders, John suddenly stopped. "No; I had better not."

"Why so?"

"I have no right; your father might think it presumption." "Presumption? after to-night!"

"Oh, that's nothing! Take the pen. It is your part to sign them, Phineas."

I obeyed.

"Isn't that better than hanging?" said John to the men, when he had distributed the little bits of paper-precious as pound notes and made them all fully understand the same. "Why, there isn't another gentleman in Norton Bury who, if you had come to burn his house down, would not have had the constables or the soldiers, have shot down one half of you like mad dogs, and sent the other half to the county jail. Now, for all your misdoings, we let you go quietly home, well fed, and with food for children too. Why, think you?"

"I doan't know," said Jacob Baines, humbly.

"I'll tell you. Because Abel Fletcher is a Quaker and a Christian."

"Hurrah for Abel Fletcher! hurrah for the Quakers!" shouted they, waking up the echoes down Norton Bury streets, which, of a surety, had never echoed that shout before. And so the riot was over.

John Halifax closed the hall door and came in, unsteadily,

all but staggering. Jael placed a chair for him, worthy soul she was wiping her old eyes. He sat down, shivering, speechless. I put my hand on his shoulder; he took it, and pressed it hard.

"Oh! Phineas, lad, I'm glad; glad it's safe over.” "Yes, thank God !"

"Ay, indeed; thank God!"

He covered his eyes for a minute or two, and then rose up pale, but quite himself again.

"Now let us go and fetch your father home."

We found him on John's bed, still asleep. But as we entered he woke. The daylight shone on his face; it looked ten years older since yesterday. He stared, bewildered and angry, at John Halifax.

-oh! I remember. Where is my son

I fell on his neck as if I had been a child.

And almost as

if it had been a child's feeble head, mechanically he smoothed and patted mine.

"Thee art not hurt? Nor any one?"

"No," John answered; "nor is either the house or the tanyard injured."

He looked amazed. "How has that been?"

"Phineas will tell you. Or, stay, better wait till you are at home."

But my father insisted on hearing. I told the whole, without any comments on John's behavior; he would not have liked it, and, besides, the facts spoke for themselves. I told the simple, plain story-nothing more.

Abel Fletcher listened at first in silence. As I proceeded, he felt about for his hat, put it on, and drew its broad brim close down over his eyes. Not even when I told him of the flour we had promised in his name, the giving of which would, as we had calculated, cost him considerable loss, did he utter a word or move a muscle.

John at length asked him if he were satisfied.

"Quite satisfied."

But having said this, he sat so long, his hands locked together on his knees, and his hat drawn down, hiding all the face except the rigid mouth and chin-sat so long, so motionless, that we became uneasy.

John spoke to him gently, almost as a son would have spoken.

"Are you very lame still? Could I help you to walk

home?"

My father looked up, and slowly held out his hand. "Thee hast been a good lad, and a kind lad to us. I thank thee."

none. But all the words in the

There was no answerworld could not match that happy silence.

MRS. PROUDIE'S RECEPTION.

BY ANTHONY TROLLOPE.

(From "Barchester Towers.")

[ANTHONY TROLLOPE: An English novelist; born in London, April 24, 1815; died December 6, 1882. He assisted in establishing the Fortnightly Review (1865). Among his works are: "The Macdermots of Ballycloran (1847); "The Kellys and the O'Kellys " (1848); "La Vendée" (1850); "The Warden" (1855); "Barchester Towers" (1857); "Doctor Thorne" (1858); "The West Indies and the Spanish Main," a book of travel (1859); "Castle Richmond" (1860); "Orley Farm" (1861-1862); “Framley Parsonage " (1861); “Tales of All Countries" (1861-1863); "North America," travels (1862); “Rachel Ray " (1863); "The Small House at Allington" (1864); "Can You Forgive Her?" (1864); "Miss Mackenzie" (1865); "The Last Chronicle of Barset" (1867); "Linda Tressel" (1868); "Phineas Finn" (1869); "The Vicar of Bullhampton" (1870); "Phineas Redux" (1873); "Lady Anna" (1874); "The Prime Minister" (1875); "The American Senator" (1877); "Is He Popenjoy?" (1878); “Thackeray," in English Men of Letters (1879); "Life of Cicero" (1880); "Ayala's Angel" (1881); "Mr. Scarborough's Family" (1882); "The Landleaguers," unfinished (1882); "An Old Man's Love" (1884).]

THE tickets of invitation were sent out from London. They were dated from Bruton Street, and were dispatched by the odious Sabbath-breaking railway, in a huge brown-paper parcel to Mr. Slope. Everybody calling himself a gentleman, or herself a lady, within the city of Barchester, and a circle of two miles round it, was included.

And now the day of the party had arrived. The bishop and his wife came down from town only on the morning of the eventful day, as behooved such great people to do; but Mr. Slope had toiled day and night to see that everything should be in right order. There had been much to do. No company had been seen in the palace since heaven knows when. New furniture had been required, new pots and pans,

new cups and saucers, new dishes and plates. Mrs. Proudie had at first declared that she would condescend to nothing so vulgar as eating and drinking; but Mr. Slope had talked, or rather written, her out of economy! Bishops should be given to hospitality, and hospitality meant eating and drinking. So the supper was conceded; the guests, however, were to stand as they consumed it.

Car

People were to arrive at ten, supper was to last from twelve till one, and at half-past one everybody was to be gone. riages were to come in at the gate in the town and depart at the gate outside. They were desired to take up at a quarter before one. It was managed excellently, and Mr. Slope was invaluable.

At half-past nine the bishop and his wife and their three daughters entered the great reception room, and very grand and very solemn they were. Mr. Slope was downstairs giving the last orders about the wine. He well understood that curates and country vicars with their belongings did not require so generous an article as the dignitaries of the close. There is a useful gradation in such things, and Marsala at 208. a dozen did very well for the exterior supplementary tables in the corner.

"Bishop," said the lady, as his lordship sat himself down, "don't sit on that sofa, if you please; it is to be kept separate for a lady."

The bishop jumped up and seated himself on a cane-bottomed chair. "A lady?" he inquired meekly; "do you mean one particular lady, my dear?"

"Yes, bishop, one particular lady," said his wife, disdaining to explain.

"She has got no legs, papa," said the youngest daughter, tittering.

"No legs!" said the bishop, opening his eyes.

"Nonsense, Netta, what stuff you talk," said Olivia. "She has got legs, but she can't use them. She has always to be kept lying down, and three or four men carry her about everywhere."

"Laws, how odd!" said Augusta. "Always carried about by four men! I'm sure I shouldn't like it. Am I right behind, mamma? I feel as if I was open;" and she turned her back to her anxious parent.

"Open! to be sure you are," said she, "and a yard of petticoat strings hanging out. I don't know why I pay such high