the performance was truly remarkable; and in the Hampton Chronicle, when an account was given of special services, gratifying mention was invariably made of Miss Buff as having presided at the organ with her usual ability.  Bessie hardly knew whether to laugh or cry as she listened.  Lady Latimer wore a countenance of ineffable patience.  She had fought the ground inch by inch with the choral party in the congregation, and inch by inch had lost it.  The responses went first, then the psalms, and this prolonged the service so seriously that twice she walked out of the church during the pause before sermon; but being pastorally condoled with on the infirmities inseparable from years which prevented her sitting through the discourse, she warmly denied the existence of any such infirmities, and the following Sunday she stayed to the end.  For the latest innovation Beechhurst was indebted to the young curate, who had a round full voice.  He would intone the prayers.  By this time my lady was tired of clerical vanities, and only remarked, with a little disdain in her voice, that Mr. Duffer’s proper place was Whitchester Cathedral.

When service was over Bessie whispered to her hostess the engagement she had made for herself during the rest of the day.  My lady gloomed for an instant, and then assented, but Bessie ought to have asked her leave.  The two elder boys were waiting at the church-door as Bessie came out, and snatched each a daintily gloved hand to conduct her home.

“Mother has gone on first to warn father,” Jack announced; and missing other friends—­the Musgraves, Mittens, and Semples, to wit—­she allowed herself to be led in triumph across the road and up the garden-walk, the garden gay as ever with late-blooming roses and as fragrant of mignonette.

When she reached the porch she was all trembling.  There was her mother, rather flushed, with her bonnet-strings untied, and her father appearing from the dining-parlor, where the table was spread for the family dinner, just as of old.

“This is as it should be; and how are you, my dear?” said Mr. Carnegie, drawing her affectionately to him.

“Is there any need to ask, Thomas?  Could she have looked bonnier if she had never left us?” said his wife fondly.

Blushing, beaming, laughing, Bessie came in.  How small the house seemed, and how full!  There was young Christie’s picture of her smiling above the mantelpiece, there was the doctor’s old bureau and the old leathern chair.  Bridget and the younger branches appeared, some of them shy of Bessie, and Totty particularly, who was the baby when she went away.  They crowded the stairs, the narrow hall.  “Make room there!” cried Jack, imperative amidst the fuss; and her mother conveyed the trembling girl up to her own dear old triangular nest under the thatch.  The books, the watery miniatures, the Oriental bowl and dishes were all in their places.  “Oh, mother, how happy I am to see it again!” cried she.  And they had a few tears to wink away, and with them the fancied forgetfulnesses of the absent years.