It seemed to be taken as a matter of course that Alma would not nurse the baby; only to Harvey did this appear a subject for regret, and he never ventured to speak of it.  The little mortal was not vigorous; his nourishment gave a great deal of trouble; but with the coming of spring he took a firmer hold on life, and less persistently bewailed his lot.  The names given to him were Hugh Basil.  When apprised of this, the strong man out in Australia wrote a heart-warming letter, and sent with it a little lump of Queensland gold, to be made into something, or kept intact, as the parents saw fit.  Basil Morton followed the old tradition, and gave a silver tankard with name and date of the new world-citizen engraved upon it.

Upon her recovery, Harvey took his wife to Madeira, where they spent three weeks.  Alma’s health needed nothing more than this voyage; she returned full of vitality.  During her absence Mrs. Frothingham superintended the household, the baby being in charge of a competent nurse.  It occurred to Harvey that this separation from her child was borne by Alma with singular philosophy; it did not affect in the least her enjoyment of travel.  But she reached home again in joyous excitement, and for a few days kept the baby much in view.  Mrs Frothingham having departed, new visitors succeeded each other:  Dora and Gerda Leach, Basil Morton and his wife, one or two of Alma’s relatives.  Little Hugh saw less and less of his mother, but he continued to thrive; and Harvey understood by now that Alma must not be expected to take much interest in the domestic side of things.  It simply was not her forte.

She had ceased to play upon her violin, save for the entertainment and admiration of friends.  After her return from Madeira she made the acquaintance of a lady skilled in water-colour drawing, and herewith began a new enthusiasm.  Her progress was remarkable, and corresponded to an energy not less than that she had long ago put forth in music.  In the pursuit of landscape she defied weather and fatigue; she would pass half the night abroad, studying moonlight, or rise at an unheard-of hour to catch the hues of dawn.  When this ardour began to fail, her husband was vexed rather than surprised.  He knew Alma’s characteristic weakness, and did not like to be so strongly reminded of it.  For about this time he was reading and musing much on questions of heredity.

In a moment of confidence he had ventured to ask Mrs. Frothingham whether she could tell him anything of Alma’s mother.  The question, though often in his mind, could hardly have passed his lips, had not Mrs. Frothingham led up to it by speaking of her own life before she married:  how she had enjoyed the cares of country housekeeping; how little she had dreamt of ever being rich; how Bennet Frothingham, who had known her in his early life, sought her out when he began to be prosperous, therein showing the fine qualities of his nature, for she had nothing in