CHAPTER LI.

MY MOTHER'S BIBLE.

I resume my pen after an interval of two years.

Within a few weeks after the events described in the last chapter Jessie and I were married. There were six bridesmaids, Josey and Florry West, and their four little sisters. On that day my mother gave uncle Bryan a Bible.

Josey is sole proprietor of the grocer's shop, and the business has wonderfully improved. She is really making and saving money. This of course is known, and has attracted the attention of more than one young man; I say more than one, for there is one in particular who seems to consider that if he were a grocer he would be in his proper groove. His chance, however, of getting into that groove does not appear to be a good one.

'I know what he's casting sheep's eyes at,' says Josey, tossing her head; I see him reckoning up the stock every time he comes into the shop.'

She does not openly discourage him; she makes him spend all his pocket-money in candied lemon-peel and uncle Bryan's medicines, which are having an immense sale.

'You are injuring that young man's constitution, Josey,' I say.

'All the better,' she replies; 'with his present constitution, he'll never suit Josey West.'

'Don't you ever intend to marry, Josey?'

'I haven't quite made up my mind, Chris; but if I don't die an old maid I shall be very much surprised.'

Turk is doing well, but I have lately discerned in him an itching to go on the stage again. He has purchased a splendid wardrobe that belonged to a famous First Villain, and he is reading a manuscript play by a new author with a character in it which he says would take all London by storm.

'No one can play that character but Turk West,' says old Mac, who is egging him on.

'It would be a thousand pities,' says Turk, 'not to play the piece. It's a work of genius--original, Chris, my boy, original.' And then he adds musingly, 'I've a good mind to; I've a good mind to. The situations are tremendous. New blood, Chris, that's what's wanted--new blood.'

Florry is just married. Her husband is a very elegant young man, and plays walking gentlemen. Every year babies are being introduced into the world by the married Wests. The number of children in that family is something amazing, and aunt Josey is idolised by all of them.

Uncle Bryan lives with us. I am prospering, and our home is a very happy one. How could it be otherwise with two such women as my mother and Jessie to brighten and bless it! A great grief, however, came to us lately.

Our union was blessed by a child--a sweet beautiful little girl, whose presence was a new happiness to us. I have not the power to describe the emotion which filled my heart when this treasure was placed in my arms; Jessie's joy and my mother's may be imagined, but it would be difficult to realise the depth of uncle Bryan's feelings towards the darling. We named her Frances, after Jessie's mother; it was uncle Bryan's wish. His love for the dear little creature became a worship; he was restless and unhappy if a waking hour passed without his seeing her. He nursed her, and prattled to her, and rocked her cradle, and would sit for hours by her side while she was sleeping. She grew to love him, and her beautiful eyes would dilate, and she would wave her dimpled arms when he held out his to her. When she was ten months old, and just when she began to lisp the word so dear to a mother's ear, she was taken from us.

'Ah, how well I remember the sad days that followed! This may sound strange, when you know that a very few months have passed since our bereavement, but it expresses my feeling. Our darling seemed, as it were, to sink into the past, and I saw her ever afterwards, as one in a deep pit looks upwards in the daylight to the heavens and sees a star there. When I am an old man, the memory of this dear child will shine with a clear light among a forest of unremembered days. On the night before she was buried, I walked to the room where she lay in her coffin. I opened the door softly, and saw uncle Bryan on his knees by the coffin's side; his hands were clasped, and on the body of our darling lay an open book from which he was reading. It was the Bible which my mother had given him on our wedding-day.

Farewell.

END OF VOL. XV. LONDON: ROBSON AND SONS, PRINTERS, PANCRAS ROAD, N.W.