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sent the little boy with a message te the nort village one December day, much against his will. It was getting dark, and the child prayed te be allowed not to go, because he would be afraid coming home. But the mistress insisted, more out of thoughtlesaness than cruelty, and the child went. On his way back he had to pass through Yalbury Wood, and eomething came! out from behind a tree and frightened him into fits. The child was quite ruined by it; he became quite a drivelling idiot, and soon afterwards died.

“Then the other woman had nothing left to live for, and vowed vengeance against that rival who had first won away her lover, and now had been the cause of her bereavement. This last affliction was certainly not intended by her thriving acquaintance, though it must be owned that when it was done she seemed bet little concerned. Whatever vengeance poor Mrs. Palmley felt, she bad no opportunity of carrying it out, and time might have softened her feelings into forgetfulness of her supposed wrongs as she dragged on her lonely life. So matters stood when, a year after the death of the child, Mrs. Palmley’s niece, who had been born and bred in the city of Exonbury, came to live with her.

“This young woman—Mises Harriet Palroley-—was a proud and handsome girl, very well brought up, and more stylish and genteel than the people of our village, as was natural, considering where she came from. She regarded herself as much above Mrs. Winter and her son in position as Mrs. Winter and her son considered themselves above poor Mrs. Palmley. But love is an unceremonious thing, and what in the world should happen but that young Jack Winter must fall wofully and wildly in love with Harriet Palmley almost. As soon as he saw her.

“She, being better educated than he, and caring