having pretty nearly made up my mind to follow inclination, I want to be told that duty does not stand in the way."

"Has anything happened to Stephen?”

"Yes, what was to happen; he fled from Mr. Bosley's this morning at daybreak, and has not been heard of since."

"How old is he?" said the rector.

"About the age of Arabella, I think,' replied Lady Azledine; "and she is in her eighteenth year."

"Rather older than Arabella, I believe," observed Sir Everton.

'Well, my dear, you ought to know his age," said her ladyship calmly; and then added, "I am sorry for the youth, but it was to be expected."

The tone of voice in which Lady Azledine intimated that her husband "ought" to know Stephen's age, clouded his brow for a moment; while her cold and proud manner of expressing her "sorrow for the youth," indicated that for some reason or other, the "youth" did not hold that place in her regard which his near

1

relationship to Sir Everton might have war

ranted.

"Lady Frances," said the Baronet, "considers I have been to blame in suffering this youngster to rusticate so long in a retired village; and I do reproach myself a little. But, truth to say, it is not among the easiest of problems to know what to do with a young fellow who, like my nephew, appears to have a decided predilection for nothing except inHowever, he shall smart for his

action. freak."

"Yes," replied the rector, "I would let him taste a full cup of the bitter waters of repentance before I allowed him to regain the Eden he has forfeited. The value of most things is known by their loss rather than their possession."

66

"I cannot say Stephen Dugard's value would be enhanced in my estimation by his being found again," remarked Lady Azle

dine.

Sir Everton changed the conversation, which was carried on till supper-time, upon indifferent

subjects; when the rector, having finished his glass, and taken an extra one for the nonce, (the night being as sharp and wintry as when Ephraim left the Hall without the benefit of any such anti-frostic,) he departed.

CHAPTER III.

The learned rabbies of the Jews
Write, there's a bone, which they call Luez,

I' th' rump of man, of such a virtue

No force in nature can do hurt to.

Hudibras, Part III. canto ii.

A WELL-REGULATED household may be compared to King, Lords, and Commons; the head of the family, who enjoys all the prerogatives of royalty, constituting a wholesome check upon the proceedings of the other two branches, viz. the family itself, or the upper house; and the kitchen, or lower.

By a fiction of Parliament, the House of Commons is never supposed to know anything of what takes place in the House of Lords, until it is regularly communicated to them; though, practically, they know everything. Even so in a family. Were a conference de

manded in the "Painted Parlour," between the "Kitchen" and the "Drawing Room," for the purpose of informing the "Kitchen" of what had been done by the "Drawing Room," it would be about as solemn a piece of unnecessary form, as when either house demands a conference in the Painted Chamber, to acquaint the other with what it already knows.

The "Kitchen," too, notoriously exercises an indirect influence over the "Drawing Room;" for many measures are there quashed, in limine, or abandoned after one or two debates, solely from an apprehension as to how they may be viewed by the lower house. Like the Commons, moreover, the "Kitchen" lies under the suspicion of being accessible to bribery and corruption. And, lastly, it is liable to be dissolved by the sovereign, and

sent about its business.

The "Drawing Room," on the other hand, consisting, like the upper house, of hereditary members, is a permanent body, whose numbers can be increased only by creation, which ought always to be the sole and legitimate act