The Trial, Or, More Links of the Daisy Chain

is, on ne fait pas voter les gr

irty-year-old Incumbent of Cocksmoor, still looking like a young deacon, en

Ethel. Is pa

ner-time. You said he was gone

on,' said Aubrey; 'and off they went. I fancy there's some illness about in the

r a little child there,' added

rry voice of the youngest, 'you mu

n? It was the very t

ertrude. 'Papa says they are to be laid up in the fa

ned, "Still his own White Flower," and it had two Calton Hill re

ather, This is only to say that she is the darlint, and for the pleasure of su

or the pleasure of being my father's so

ieve he had as soon drive papa out as walk wit

driven my father out,' said Aubrey, again

ecovering herself, she said, 'Poor Hector, he

much otherwise he

p by pairs, and carry off two instead of one. Did you ever see me with so sh

old Richard to say nothing about it! Hector had coaxed and pleaded, pathetically talked of his great empty house at Maplewood, and declared that till he might take Blanche away, he would not leave Stoneborough; he would bring down all sorts of gossip on his courtship, he would worry Ethel, and take care she finished nobody's education. What did Blanche want with more education? She knew enough for him. Couldn't Ethel be satisfied with Aubrey and Gertrude?

destiny that she had always seen before her. She was a picture of a bride; and when she and Hector hung round the Doctor, insisting that Edinburgh should be the first place they should visit, and calling forth minute directions for their pilgrimage to the scenes of his youth, promising to come

r London, and Tom May had returned to Cambridge, leaving the home party at the minimum of four, since, Coc

her urn, now giving out its last sighs, profiting by the leisure to read the county newspaper, while she contin

cipline thought impossible in the drawing-room; but Aubrey was a rival pet, and with the family characteristics of aquiline features, dark gray eyes, and beautiful teeth, had an air of fragility and easy languor that showed his exercise of the immunities of ill-health. He had been Ethel's pupil till Tom's last year at Eton, when he was sent thither, and had taken a good place; but his brother's vigilant and tender care could not save him from an attack on the chest, that settled his public-school education for ever, to his severe mortification, just when Tom's shower of honours was displayi

perciliousness, though it had given Eton polish to the home-bred manners; it had made sisters valuable, and awakened a desire for masculine companionship. He did not rebel against his sister's rule; she was nearly a mother to him, and had always been the most active presiden

her eyes on the newspaper, tried all her vessels round, and found cream-j

wakening and laughing. 'Those

said Aubrey, 'the urn op

pa comes home, and perhaps you'll have som

d, stood up, stretched every limb portentously, and said he should go off too. Ethel looked at him anxiously, felt his hand, a

been doing?'

mething imprudent in the damp. I never know what to do. I can't bear him to be a coddle; yet he is always catching

aid Richard; 'he may be thinki

hree parts of a boy or man who thinks of his womankin

s duty without being three parts

ers have been the more spiritual because their animal fr

y putting you in mind that there is compensation. But I must be off. I am sorry I

tions of the young couple had had to be relinquished at the voice of authority without a trial. They had received the charge of persons as much in need of them as unreclaimed savages, but to whom there was less apparent glory in ministering. A widespread district of very colonial colonists, and the charge of a college for their uncultivated sons, was quite as troublesome as the most ardent self-devotion could desire; and the hardships and disagreeables, though severe, made no figure in history-nay, it required ingenuity to gather their existence from Meta's bright letters, although, from Mr

her, so the two sisters waited till they heard the latch-key. Ethel

re you not coming, p

nd take off this coat;' an

the drawing-room, where Mary was boiling up th

at's the

when some infectious thing has been about. Beside

ing there fatigue and concern that made them-rather awe-struck-bide their time till it should suit him to speak. Mary was afraid he would wait till she was gone; dear old Mary, who at twenty-two never dreamt of r

ments are upon us while we are

papa? Not the

in the most aggravated form. Two deaths in one house, and I a

pa?' ask

onder, living in voluntary filth; but it is all over the street-will

d,' said Ethel, 'without ou

b, Henry Ward, thought it not worth while to trouble me about a simple epidemic. Simple epidemic indeed!' repeated Dr. May, changing his tone from ironi

mean that

im a practical lesson

d Mary, looking so much dismayed

ng so audacious as to lay hold of the doctors,

much of it,' said Ethel; 'so no won

om will do some day, full of his lectures and his hospitals, and is nettled and displeased to fi

physician, pa

s were parish patients, and I don't mean that his treatment was amiss. Spencer is right, it was an atmosphere where there was no saving anyone, but if he had not been so delighte

was Mr.

self, here's a

a picture of wh

e in all his difficulties these thirty years, didn't like it at all; but Mr. Henry was so c

ught it to li

ugly case that-and coming out I meet poor Ward himself, wanting me to see Henry, and there's the other boy sickening too. Then I went down and saw all those cases in the Lower Ponds, and have been running about the

as Dr. S

l have it that his theory is proved. Then I meant him to keep clear of it. He has always been liable to malaria and all that sort of thing, and has not strength for an illness. I told him to mind the ordinary practice for me; and what do I find him doing the next thing, but opera

we two have had

h of

wn to B

home. You can perform quarantine with Richard, and then go to Flora, i

the latter part of the conversation, 'if you please, w

nics. Don't take nonsense into your head. Th

afraid Aubrey was a good while choosing fishing-tackle at Shearman's yesterday with Leonard Ward; and it m

was fast asleep; but there was that about him which softened the weary sharpness of his father's manner, and caused him to d

had enough on his hands to-day. The boy will slee

his room without waking him, if y

near him before she takes Gertrude to Cocksmoor; and you,

't stay

not to fall asleep on my

to fear,' said Ethel. 'Too much depen

u will not leav

s right, and it will not do to waste one's stren

away. Richard will have to keep away for Daisy's sake, and you can't d

moment's thought. 'If it were only Aubrey, I could

ink he is goi

ed, and unhappy, and he must not come home and find no one to talk to or to look cheerful. So, Mary, unles

nor felt so much honoured. 'Do you think

to get through all this, Mary, it must not be by riding out on perhapses. Now let us put

k back upon when one hour has drifted from smooth water to turbid currents. There was a sort of awe in seeing the mysterious gates of sorrow again unclosed; yet, darling of her own as Aubrey was, Ethel's first thoughts and fears were pr

bewildered and distressed, yet rather enjoying the f

he bedside of his old patient, Aubrey, wh

, 'for once there will be a case properly treated. Now, E

are delighted,'

t the valuable prece

ed on to prove your theory,' said A

th, but to Ethel's private entreaty that he would not add to her father's distress in the freshness of Margaret's death, and the parting with Norman. He had never ceased to mourn over the lost opportunity, and to cast up to his frie

ey were; and in the present emergency the battle whether the enemy had travelled by infection, or was the product of the Pond Buildings' miasma, was the favourite enlivenment of the disagreeing doctors, in their brief intervals of repose in the stern conflict which they were waging

s of 'intelligent nursing' was fully realized, Ethel and Mary were so occupied by him, that it was a fearful thing to guess how

f innovation, been averse to the importation-as likely to have no effect but putting nonsense into girls' heads, and worrying the sick poor-was so entirely conquered, that he took off his hat to them across the street, importuned them to drink tea with his daughters, and never came home without dilating on th