times, before the gentleman whom he had seen before, came in; which he did at last in a very great hurry.

He was closeted with Mr. Witherden for some little time, and Mr. Abel had been called in to assist at the conference, before Kit, wondering very much what he was wanted for, was summoned to attend them.

"Christopher," said the gentleman, turning to him directly he entered the room, "I have found your old master and young mistress."

"No, sir! Have you, though?" returned Kit, his eyes sparkling with delight. "Where are they, sir? How are they, sir? Are they are they near here ?" "A long way from here," returned the gentleman, shaking his head. "But I am going away to-night to bring them back, and I want you to go with me."

66

T Me, sir?" cried Kit, full of joy and surprise.
"The place," said the strange gentleman, turning
thoughtfully to the Notary, "indicated by this man of the
dogs, is-how far from here-sixty miles?"

C

From sixty to seventy."

Humph! If we travel post all night, we shall reach there in good time to-morrow morning. Now, the only question is, as they will not know me, and the child, God bless her, would think that any stranger pursuing them had a design upon her grandfather's liberty---I cannot do better than take this lad, whom they both know and will readily remember, as an assurance to them of my friendly inten

tions?"

"Certainly not," replied the Notary. "Take Christopher by all means."

"I beg your pardon, sir," said Kit, who had listened to this discourse with a lengthening countenance, "but if that's the reason, I'm afraid I should do more harm than good---Miss Nell, sir, she knows me, and would trust in me, I am sure; but old master--I don't know why, gentlemen; nobody does--would not bear me in his sight after he had been ill, and Miss Nell herself told me that I must not go near him or let him see me any more. I should spoil all that you were doing if I went, I'm afraid. I'd give the world to go, but you had better not take me, sir."

"Another difficulty!" cried the impetuous gentleman. "Was ever man so beset as I? Is there nobody else that knew them, nobody else in whom they had any confidence? Solitary as their lives were, is there no one person who would serve my purpose?"

"Is there, Christopher?" said the Notary.
"Not one, sir," replied Kit. "Yes, though---there's my

mother."

"Did they know her?" said the single gentleman. "Know her, sir! why, she was always coming backward and forward. They were as kind to her as they were to me. Bless you, sir, she expected they'd come back to her house."

"Then where the devil is the woman?" said the impatient gentleman, catching up his hat." Why isn't she here? Why is that woman always out of the way when she is most wanted?"

diving into lanes and alleys, and stopping or turning aside for nothing, until he came in front of the Old Curiosity Shop, when he came to a stand; partly from habit and partly from being out of breath.

It was a gloomy autumn evening, and he thought the old place had never looked so dismal as in its dreary twilight. The windows broken, the rusty sashes rattling in their frames, the deserted house a dull barrier dividing the glaring lights and bustle of the street into two long lines, and standing in the midst, cold, dark and empty, presented a cheerless spectacle which mingled harshly with the bright prospects the boy had been building up for its late inmates, and came like a disappointment or misfortune. Kit would have had a good fire roaring up the empty chimneys, lights sparkling and shining through the windows, people moving briskly to and fro, voices in cheerful conversation, something in unison with the new hopes that were astir. He had not expected that the house would wear any different aspect-had known indeed that it could not; but coming upon it in the midst of eager thoughts and expectations, it checked the current in its flow, and darkened with a mournful shadow.

Kit, however, fortunately for himself, was not learned enough or contemplative enough to be troubled with presages of evil afar off; and having no mental spectacles to assist his vision in this respect, saw nothing but the dull house, which jarred uncomfortably upon his previous thoughts. So, almost wishing that he had not passed it, though hardly knowing why, he hurried on again, making up, by his increased speed, for the few moments he had lost. "Now, if she should be out," thought Kit, as he approached the poor dwelling of his mother," and I not able to find her, this impatient gentleman would be in a pretty taking. And sure enough there's no light, and the door's fast. Now, God forgive me for saying so, but if this is Little Bethel's doing, I wish little Bethel was farther off," said Kit, checking himself, and knocking at the door.

A second knock brought no reply from within the house; but caused a woman over the way to look out and inquire who that was, wanting Mrs. Nubbles.

"Me," said Kit. "She's at-a Little Bethel, I suppose?" getting out the name of the obnoxious conventicle with some reluctance, and laying a spiteful emphasis upon the words.

The neighbor nodded assent.

"Then, pray tell me where it is," said Kit, "for I have come on a pressing matter, and must fetch her out, even if she was in the pulpit."

It was not very easy to procure a direction to the fold in question, as none of the neighbors were of the flock that resorted thither, and few knew any thing more of it than the namie. At last, a gossip of Mrs. Nubbles's, who had accompanied her to chapel on one or two occasions when a comfortable cup of tea had preceded her devotions, furnished the needful information, which Kit had no sooner obtained than he started off again.

Little Bethel might have been nearer, and might have been in a straigher road; though in that case the reverend In a word, the single gentleman was bursting out of the gentleman who presided over its congregation would have office, bent upon laying violent hands on Kit's mother, lost his favorite allusion to the crooked ways by which it forcing her into a post-chaise, and carrying her off, when was approached, and which enabled him to liken it to Parathis novel kind of abduction was with some difficulty pre-dise itself, in contradistinction to the parish church and the vented by the joint efforts of Mr. Abel and the Notary, who restrained him by dint of their remonstrances, and persuaded him to sound Kit upon the probability of her being able and willing to undertake such a journey on so short a

notice.

This occasioned some doubts on the part of Kit, and some violent demonstrations on that of the single gentleman, and a great many soothing speeches on that of the Notary and Mr. Abel. The upshot of the business was, that Kit, after weighing the matter in his mind and considering it carefully, promised, on behalf of his mother, that she should be ready within two hours from that time to undertake the expedition, and engaged to produce her in that place, in all respects equipped and prepared for the journey, before the specified period had expired.

Having given this pledge, which was rather a bold one, and not particularly easy of redemption, Kit lost no time in sallying forth and taking measures for its immediate fulfil

ment.

CHAPTER XLI.

Krr made his way through the crowded streets, dividing the stream of people, dashing across the busy roadways,

broad thoroughfare leading thereunto. Kit found it at last,
after some trouble, and, pausing at the door to take breath
that he might enter with becoming decency, passed into the
chapel.
It was not badly named in one respect, being in truth a
particularly little Bethel-a Bethel of the smallest dimen.
sions-with a small number of small pews, and a small pul-
pit, in which a small gentleman, (by trade a Shoemaker,
and by calling a Divine) was delivering in a by no means
small voice, a by no means small sermon, judging of its di-
mensions by the condition of his audience, which, if their
gross amount were but small, comprised a still smaller num-
ber of hearers, as the majority were slumbering.

Among these was Kit's mother, who, finding it a matter of extreme difficulty to keep her eyes open after the fatigues of last night, and feeling their inclination to close strongly backed and seconded by the arguments of the preacher, had yielded to the drowsiness that overpowered her, and fallen asleep; though not so soundly but that she could from time to time utter a slight and almost inaudible groan, as if in recognition of the orator's doctrines. The baby in her arms was as fast asleep as she; and little

Master Humphrey's Clock:

Jacob, whose youth prevented him from recognizing in this
prolonged spiritual nourishment any thing half as interesting
as oysters, was alternately very fast asleep and very wide
awake, as his inclination to slumber or his terror of being
personally alluded to in the discourse, gained the mastery
over him.

"And now I'm here," thought Kit, gliding into the near-
est empty pew which was opposite his mother's, and on the
other side of the little aisle, "how am I ever to get at her or
persuade her to come out! I might as well be twenty miles
off. She'll never wake till it's all over, and there goes the
clock again! If he would but leave off for a minute, or if
they'd only sing!"-

But there was little encouragement to believe that either event would happen for a couple of hours to come. preacher went on telling them what he meant to convince The them of before he had done, and it was clear that if he only kept to one half of his promises and forgot the other, he was good for that time at least.

In his desperation and restlessness, Kit cast his eyes about the chapel, and happening to let them fall upon a little seat in front of the clerk's desk, could scarcely believe them when they showed him-Quilp!

He rubbed them twice or thrice, but still they insisted that Quilp was there, and there indeed he was, sitting with his hands upon his knees, and his hat between them on a little wooden bracket, with the accustomed grin upon his dirty face, and his eyes fixed upon the ceiling. He certainly did not glance at Kit or at his mother, and appeared utterly unconscious of their presence; still Kit could not help feeling directly that the attention of the sly little fiend was fastened upon them, and upon nothing else.

But astonished as he was by the apparition of the dwarf among the Little Bethelites, and not free from a misgiving | that it was the forerunner of some trouble or annoyance, he was compelled to subdue his wonder and take active measures for the withdrawal of his parent, as the evening was now creeping on, and the matter grew serious. Therefore, the next time little Jacob awoke, Kit set himself to attract his wondering attention, and this not being a very difficult task (one sneeze effected it,) he signed to him to rouse his mother.

Ill-luck would have it, however, that just then the preacher, in a forcible exposition of one head of his discourse, leaned over the pulpit-desk so that very little more of him than his legs remained inside; and while he made vehement gestures with his right hand, and held on with his left, stared, or seemed to stare, straight into little Jacob's eyes, threatening him by his strained look and attitude-so it appeared to the child-that if he so much as moved a muscle, he, the preacher, would be literally, and not figuratively "down upon him" that instant. In this fearful state of things, distracted by the sudden appearance of Kit, and fascinated by the eyes of the preacher, the miserable Jacob sat bolt upright, wholly incapable of motion, strongly disposed to cry, but afraid to do so, and returning his pastor's gaze until his infant eyes seemed starting from their sockets.

"If I must do it openly, I must," thought Kit. With that, he walked softly out of his pew and into his mother's, and, as Mr. Swiveller would have observed if he had been present, "collared" the baby without speaking a word. "Hush, mother!" whispered Kit. me, I've got something to tell you." "Where am I?" said Mrs. Nubbles. "In this blessed Little Bethel," returned her son, peevishly.

"Come along with

Blessed, indeed," cried Mrs. Nubbles, catching at the word. "Oh, Christopher, how have I been edified this night!"

"Yes, yes, I know," said Kit, hastily; "but come along, mother, every body's looking at us. Do n't make a noisebring Jacob-that's right."

"Stay, Satan, stay!" cried the preacher, as Kit was moving off.

"The gentleman says you 're to stay, Christopher," whispered his mother.

"Stay, Satan, stay!" roared the preacher again. "Tempt not the woman that doth incline her ear to thee, but hearken to the voice of him that calleth. He hath a lamb from the fold!" cried the preacher, raising his voice still higher and pointing to the baby. "He beareth off a lamb, a precious lamb! He goeth about like a wolf in the night season, and inveigleth the tender lambs!"

ering this strong language, and being somewhat excited by
Kit was the best tempered fellow in the world, but consid
the circumstances in which he was placed, he faced round
to the pulpit with the baby in his arms, and replied aloud,
"No, I do n't. He 's my brother."
"He's my brother!" cried the preacher.

such a thing? and do n't call me names, if you please; what
harm have I done? I should n't have come to take 'em
"He is n't" said Kit, indignantly. "How can you say
away unless I was obliged, you may depend upon that; and
I wanted to do it very quiet, but you would n't let me.
Now, you have the goodness to abuse Satan and them as
much as you like, sir, and let me alone, if you please."

with an indistinct recollection of having seen the people
So saying, Kit marched out of the chapel, followed by his
mother and little Jaceb, and found himself in the open air,
wake up and look surprised, without moving his eyes from
the ceiling, or appearing to take the smallest notice of any
thing that passed.

her eyes, "what have you done! I never can go there
again,-never!"
"Oh, Kit!" said his mother, with her handkerchief to

of pleasure you took last night that made it necessary for you
"I'm glad of it, mother. What was there in the little bit
to be low-spirited and sorrowful to-night? That's the way
say along with that chap, that you are sorry for it. More
shame for you, mother, I was going to say."
you do. If you 're happy or merry ever, you come here to

66

what you say, I know, but you're talking sinfulness." Hush, dear!" said Mrs. Nubbles, "you don't mean "Do n't mean it? But I do mean it," retorted Kit. "I humor are thought greater sins in Heaven than shirt-collars do n't believe, mother, that harmless cheerfulness and good are, and that those chaps are just about as right and sensi ble in putting down the one as in leaving off the otheryou'll promise not to cry, that 's all; and you take the baby that's my belief. But I won't say any thing more about it, it that's a lighter weight, and give me little Jacob; and as we news I bring which will surprise you a little, I can tell There-that's right. Now you look as if you'd never go along (which we must do pretty quick) I'll tell you the again; and here's the baby; and little Jacob, you get a'top seen Little Bethel in all your life, as I hope you never w of my back and catch hold of me tight round the neck, and whenever a Little Bethel parson calls you a precious lama, he's said for a twelvemonth, and that if he'd got a little or says your brother's one, you tell him it 's the truest thing more of the lamb himself, and less of the mint-sauce-not being quite so sharp and sour over it-I should like him all the better. That's what you 've got to say to him, Jacob."

you

and cheering up his mother, the children, and himself, by the one simple process of determining to be in good humor, Talking on in this way, half in jest and half in earnest, Kit led them briskly forward; and on the road home related with which he had intruded on the solemnity of Little Bethel what had passed at the Notary's house, and the purpose

service was required of her, and presently fell into a His mother was not a little startled on learning what confusion of ideas, of which the most prominent were that it was a great honor and dignity to ride in a postchildren behind. But this objection and a great many chaise, and that it was a moral impossibility to leave the others, founded upon certain other articles having no exis Kit, who opposed to each and every of them, the pleasure tence in the wardrobe of Mrs. Nubbles, were overcome by back in triumph. of recovering Nell, and the delight it would be to bring her

"There's only ten minutes, now, mother,”—said Kit, in what you want, and we 'll be off directly." when they reached home. "There's a bandbox. Throw To tell how Kit then hustled into the box all sorts of things he left out every thing likely to be of the smallest use; which could by no remote contingency be wanted, and how children, and how the children at first cried dismally, and how a neighbor was persuaded to come and stop with the sible and unheard-of toys; how Kit's mother would n't leave then laughed heartily.on being promised all kinds of impos off kissing them, and how Kit could n't make up his mind to be vexed with her for doing it; would take more time and room than we can spare. So, passing over all such matters, it is sufficient to say that within a few minutes after the two hours had expired, Kit and his mother arrived at the Notary's door, where a post-chaise was already waiting.

"With four horses, I declare!" said Kit, quite aghast at the preparations. Well, you are going to do it, mother! Here she is, sir. Here's my mother. She's quite ready, sir."

"That's well," returned the gentleman. "Now, do n't be in a flutter, ma'am; you'll be taken care of. Where's the box with the new clothing and necessaries for them?" "Here it is!" said the Notary. "In with it, Christopher." "All right, sir," replied Kit. "Quite ready now, sir." "Then come along," said the single gentleman. And thereupon he gave his arm to Kit's mother, handed her into the carriage as politely as you please, and took his seat beside her.

Up went the steps, bang went the door, round whirled the wheels, and off they rattled, with Kit's mother hanging out at one window waving a damp pocket-handkerchief, and screaming out a great many messages to little Jacob and the baby, of which nobody heard a word.

Kit stood in the middle of the road, and looked after them with tears in his eyes-not brought there by the depar租 ture he witnessed, but by the return to which he looked forward. "They went away," he thought, "on foot, with nobody to speak to them or say a kind word at parting, and they'll come back drawn by four horses, with this rich gentleman for their friend, and all their troubles over! She 'll forget that she has taught me to write.

Whatever Kit thought about after this, took some time to think of, for he stood gazing up the lines of shining lamps, long after the chaise had disappeared, and did not return into the house until the Notary and Mr. Abel, who had themselves lingered outside till the sound of the wheels was no longer distinguishable, had several times wondered what could possibly detain him.

CHAPTER XLII.

Ir behoves us to leave Kit for a while, thoughtful and expectant, and to follow the fortunes of little Nell; resuming the thread of our narrative at the point where it was left some chapters back.

In one of those wanderings in the evening time, when, following the two sisters at a humble distance, she felt, in her sympathy with them and her recognition in their trials of something akin to her own loneliness of spirit, a comfort and consolation which made such moments a time of deep delight, though the softened pleasure they yielded was of that kind which lives and dies in tears-in one of those wanderings at the quiet hour of twilight, when sky, and earth, and air, and rippling water, and sound of distant bells, claimed kindred with the emotions of the solitary child, and inspired her with soothing thoughts, but not of a child's world or its easy joys-in one of those rambles which had now become her only pleasure or relief from care, light had faded into darkness and evening deepened into night, and still the young creature lingered in the gloom; feeling a relationship in Nature so serene and still, when the noise of tongues and glare of garish lights would have been solitude indeed.

The sisters had gone home, and she was alone. She raised her eyes to the bright stars, looking down so mildly from the wide worlds of air, and gazing on them, found new stars burst upon her view, and more beyond, and more beyond again, until the whole great expanse sparkled with shining spheres, raising higher and higher in immeasurable space, eternal in their numbers as in their changeless and incorruptible existence. She bent over the calm river, and saw them shining in the same majestic order as when the dove beheld them gleaming through the swollen waters, upon the mountain tops down far below, and dead mankind a million fathoms deep.

the distant church-clock bell struck nine. Rising at the sound, she retraced her steps, and turned thoughtfully to ward the town.

She had gained a little wooden bridge, which, thrown across the stream, led into a meadow in her way, when she came suddenly upon a ruddy light, and looking forward more attentively, discerned that it proceeded from what ap| peared to be an encampment of gipsies, who had made a fire in one corner at no great distance from the path, and were sitting or lying round it. As she was too poor to have any fear of them, she did not alter her course, (which indeed, she could not have done without going a long way round,) but quickened her pace a little, and kept straight on. A movement of timid curiosity impelled her, when she approached the spot, to glance toward the fire. There was a form between it and her, the outline strongly developed against the light, which caused her to stop abruptly. Then, as if she had reasoned with herself and were assured that it could not be, or had satisfied herself that it was not, that of the person she had supposed, she went on again.

But at that instant the conversation, whatever it was, which had been carrying on near this fire, was resumed, and the tones of the voice that spoke-she could not distinguish words-sounded as familiar to her as her own.

She turned, and looked back. The person had been seated before, but was now in a standing posture, and leaning forward upon a stick on which he rested both hands. The attitude was no less familiar to her than the tone of voice had been. It was her grandfather.

Her first impulse was to call to him; her next to wonder who his associates could be, and for what purpose they were together. Some vague apprehension succeeded, and, yielding to the strong inclination it awakened, she drew nearer to the place; not advancing across the open field, however, but creeping toward it by the hedge.

In this way she advanced within a few feet of the fire, and standing among a few young trees, could both see and hear, without much danger of being observed.

There were no women or children, as she had seen in other gipsy camps they had passed on their wayfaring, but one gipsy-a tall, athletic man, who stood with his arms folded, leaning against a tree at a little distance off, looking now at the fire, and now, under his black eyelashes, at three other men who were there, with a watchful but half-concealed interest in their conversation. Of these her grandfather was one; the others she recognised as the first card-players at the public-house on the eventful night of the storm-the man whom they had called Isaac List, and his gruff companion. One of the low, arched gipsy-tents, common to that people, was pitched hard by, but it either was, or appeared to be, empty.

"Well, are you going?" said the stout man, looking up from the ground where he was lying at his ease, into her grandfather's face. Go, if you like. Your'e your own master, I hope ?"

"Do n't vex him," returned Isaac List, who was squatting like a frog on the other side of the fire, and had so screwed himself up that he seemed to be squinting all over; "he did 'nt mean any offence."

"You keep me poor and plunder me, and make a sport and jest of me besides," said the old man, turning from one to the other. "Ye'll drive me mad among ye."

The utter irresolution and feebleness of the grey-haired child, contrasted with the keen and cunning looks of those in whose hands he was, smote upon the little listener's heart. But she constrained herself to attend to all that passed, and to note each look and word.

"Confound you, what do you mean!" said the stout man, rising a little, and supporting himself upon his elbow. "Keep you poor!" You'd keep us poor if you could, would n't you? That's the way with you whining, puny, pitiful players When you lose, you 're martyrs ; but I do n't find that when you win, you look upon the other losers in that light. As to plunder!" cried the fellow, raising his voice, “Damme, what do you mean by such ungentlemanly language as plunder, eh?"

The child sat silently beneath a tree, hushed in her very breath by the stillness of night, and all its attendant wonders. The time and place awoke reflection, and she thought with a quiet hope-less hope, perhaps, than resignation on the past, and present, and what was yet before her. Between the old man and herself there had come a gradual separation, harder to bear than any former sorrow. Every evening and often in the day-time too, he was absent, alone; and The speaker laid himself down again at full length, and although she well knew where he went, and why-too well gave one or two short, angry kicks, as if in further expresfrom the constant drain upon her scanty purse and from hission of his unbounded indignation. It was quite plain that haggard looks-he evaded all inquiry, maintained a strict he acted the bully and his friend the peace-maker, for some reserve, and even shunned her presence. particular purpose; or rather it would have been to any one but the weak old man; for they exchanged glances quite openly, both with each other and with the gipsy, who

She sat meditating sorrowfully upon this change, and mingling it, as it were, with every thing about her, when