tervention of a strong lock to keep him where he was. At length, however, as the disorder advanced, his spirit sank, and he continued to take the medicines which were prescribed, and not take the food which was proscribed, with a sulky sullenness which, if not more amiable, was at least more endurable than his violence.

At half-past seven o'clock on the evening of the departure of the amiable family and their charming friend, I became the father of a fine boy, pronounced by Mrs. Wells and the nurse to be as like me as possible. The Doctor looked pleased, and congratulating me with the greatest warmth, announced that which was the welcomest part of his important intelligence, that the mother and child were "as well as could be expected."

CHAPTER VII.

"So, then, I am a father,—a new tie binds me to the world, and Harriet absolutely worships her infant. All is going on well. The house is perfectly quiet; even the canary-birds, unprovoked and unexcited, are mute. Still I occasionally hear a sound hitherto strange to Ashmead, the shrill cry of my son and heir; he that, please God, is to be hereafter something good and great. How strange is such an anticipation! Only fancy that Dr. Johnson was once a baby; and that the height of my ambition would be to see that dear, little, soft, red thing upstairs, just such a man as he, in due

course of time; but, to be sure, all the babies I ever saw were scft, and red, and remarkably like their fathers, and so is mine."

This was the sort of soliloquy in which I was indulging when Mrs. Wells came to me in the garden to enquire, at Harriet's suggestion, whether I had written to announce the event to Cuthbert.

"Where am I to find him?" said I. " When he went away he said nothing about either my wife or my child. He left no address nor any direction where a letter might find him.”

"That odious Mrs. Brandyball," said Mrs. Wells, "will no doubt be able to forward anything to him; and Harriet feels that it would be extremely wrong not to let him hear."

"She is quite right," said I; "but there is something extremely repugnant to my feelings in making Mrs. Brandyball the medium of such a communication."

"What else can you do?" said my prudent mother-in-law. "As the child is a boy, and as your brother has expressed his desire of standing

godfather, it would be losing an excellent chance of a provision for him hereafter."

"That desire," said I, "was expressed before the sudden dispersion of the tribe; in all probability he has by this time forgotten it altogether; and as it is quite certain that we shall hear from some of them in the way of inquiry after Tom's health, I feel very much disposed to postpone the announcement until the opportunity offers of making it direct."

"Of course, my dear Gilbert," said Mrs. Wells, "you are master of your own house, and must do as you please."

Yes, thought I to myself, I feel more master of it than ever I did before: but this by no means disagreeable consciousness was not altogether without alloy. In the first place, the departure of Cuthbert had entirely changed the manners and customs of Ashmead, just at the very moment when, from being isolated myself, the alteration was made more manifest; and in the second place, the alteration was effected in an unpleasant manner;-in short, I was worried

and vexed at my own emancipation from the controul I had so long felt irksome. What strange creatures we are!

"In my mind," said Wells, who had joined us, "your brother Cuthbert is snared,—as safe as a hare in a poacher's bag;-his fanienti disposition and almost helpless habits have no chance against the bustling activity of that Mrs. Brandyball, whose real character, thanks to our convivial re-union the other evening, we are tolerably well acquainted with."

"I am apprehensive

" said I.

"I go beyond you," replied Wells: "however, as my poor Fan used to say when I took leave to hint an occasional doubt about our late friend Merman's disinterestedness, it is of no use anticipating evils.”

"Is there no chance," said I, "of that affair ever being on again?"

"I think not," said Wells. "Indeed, with all my avowed predilection for early marriages, I should not wish a daughter of mine to submit to caprice, or permit her affections to overcome