of solid silver, and presiding with great dignity in her straight, high-backed chair.  She was fond, too, of the ruby wine, and her cellar was stored with the choicest liquors, some of which she had brought with her from home, while others, it was said, had belonged to her grandfather, and for half a century had remained unseen and unmolested, while the cobwebs of time had woven around them a misty covering, making them still more valuable to the lady, who knew full well how age improved such things.

Regularly each day she rode in her ponderous carriage, sometimes alone and sometimes accompanied by Hester, the daughter of old Hagar, a handsome, intelligent-looking girl, who, after two or three years of comparative idleness at Mill Farm, went to Meriden, Conn., as seamstress in a family which had advertised for such a person.  With her departed the only life of the house, and during the following year there ensued a monotonous quiet, which was broken at last for Hagar by the startling announcement that her daughter’s young mistress had died four months before, and the husband, a gray-haired, elderly man, had proved conclusively that he was in his dotage by talking of marriage to Hester, who, ere the letter reached her mother, would probably be the third bride of one whose reputed wealth was the only possible inducement to a girl like Hester Warren.

With an immense degree of satisfaction Hagar read the letter through, exulting that fortune had favored her at last.  Possessed of many sterling qualities, Hagar Warren had one glaring fault, which had imbittered her whole life.  Why others were rich while she was poor she could not understand, and her heart rebelled at the fate which had made her what she was.

But Hester would be wealthy—­nay, would perhaps one day rival the haughty Mrs. Miller across the water, who had been her playmate; there was comfort in that, and she wrote to her daughter expressing her entire approbation, and hinting vaguely of the possibility that she herself might some time cease to be a servant, and help do the honors of Mr. Hamilton’s house!  To this there came no reply, and Hagar was thinking seriously of making a visit to Meriden, when one rainy autumnal night, nearly a year after Hester’s marriage, there came another letter sealed with black.  With a sad foreboding Hagar opened it, and read that Mr. Hamilton had failed; that his house and farm were sold, and that he, overwhelmed with mortification both at his failure and the opposition of his friends to his last marriage, had died suddenly, leaving Hester with no home in the wide world unless Madam Conway received her again into her family.