“I will,” said Caroline; “I can write much better than tell.  And you will come back, Mary?”

“As soon as I can get a holiday, my dear, indeed I will.”

Carey was too much worn out not to repose on the promise, and though she was unwilling to let her friend go, she said very little more.

Mary longed to give her a cup of strong coffee, and suggested it to Janet; but headaches were so new in the family, that domestic remedies had not become well-known.  Janet instantly rushed down to order it, but in the state of the house at that moment, it was nearly as easy to get a draught of pearls.

“But she shall have it, Miss Ogilvie,” said Janet, putting on her hat.  “Where’s the nearest grocer?”

“Oh, never mind, my dear,” sighed the patient.  “It will go off of itself, when I can get to sleep.”

“You shall have it,” returned Janet.

And Mary having taken as tender a farewell as Caroline was able to bear, they walked off together; but the girl did not respond to the kindness of Miss Ogilvie.

She was too miserable not to be glum, too reserved to be open to a stranger.  Mary guessed a little of the feeling, though she feared that an uncomfortable daughter might be one of poor Carey’s troubles, and she could not guess the girl’s sense of banishment from all that she had enjoyed, society, classes, everything, or her feeling that the Magnum Bonum itself was imperilled by exile into the land of dulness, which of course the poor child exaggerated in her imagination.  Her only consolation was to feel herself the Masterman Ready of the shipwreck.

CHAPTER VI.  ENCHANTED GROUND.

And sometimes a merry train
Comes upon us from the lane
All through April, May, or June,
Every gleaming afternoon;
All through April, May, and June,
Boys and maidens, birds and bees,
Airy whisperings from all trees. 
                  Petition of the Flowers-—Keble.

The headache had been carried off by a good night’s rest; a droll, scrambling breakfast had been eaten, German fashion, with its head-quarters on the kitchen table; and everybody running about communicating their discoveries.  Bobus and Jock had set off to school, and poor little Armine, who firmly believed that his rejection was in consequence of his confusion between os, ossis, and os, oris, and was very sore about it, had gone with Allen and Barbara to see them on their way, and Mother Carey and Janet had agreed to get some real work done and were actually getting through business, when in rushed, rosy and eager, Allen, Armine, and Babie, with arms stretched and in breathless haste.

“Mother Carey!  Oh, mother! mammie, dear! come and see!”

“Come-—where?”

“To fairy-land.  Get her bonnet, Babie.”

“Out of doors, you boy? just look there!”

“Oh! bother all that!  It can wait.”