off much, but his lingering might. Anyway, it's an uncertain state of matters, you see."

"I see," said I.

Consequently," pursued Mr. Omer, "Em'ly's still a little down and a little fluttered; perhaps, upon the whole, she's more so than she was. Every day she seems to get fonder and fonder of her uncle, and more loath to part from all of us. A kind word from me brings the tears into her eyes; and if you was to see her with my daughter Minnie's little girl you'd never forget it. Bless my heart alive!" said Mr. Omer, pondering, "how she loves that child!"

Having so favorable an opportunity, it occurred to me to ask Mr. Omer, before our conversation should be interrupted by the return of his daughter and her husband, whether he knew anything of Martha.

"Ah!" he rejoined, shaking his head, and looking very much dejected. "No good. A sad story, sir, however you come to know it. I never thought there was harm in the girl. I would n't wish to mention it before my daughter Minnie - for she'd take me up directly but I never did. None of us ever did."

Mr. Omer, hearing his daughter's footstep before I heard it, touched me with his pipe, and shut up one eye as a caution. She and her husband came in immediately afterward.

Their report was, that Mr. Barkis was " as bad as bad could be;" that he was quite unconscious; and that Mr. Chillip had mournfully said in the kitchen, on going away just now, that the College of Physicians, the College of Surgeons, and Apothecaries' Hall, if they were all called in together, could n't help him. He was past both colleges, Mr. Chillip said, and the Hall could only poison him.

Hearing this, and learning that Mr. Peggotty was there, I determined to go to the house at once. I bade good-night to Mr. Omer, and to Mr. and Mrs. Joram; and directed my steps thither, with a solemn feeling, which made Mr. Barkis quite a new and different creature.

My low tap at the door was answered by Mr. Peggotty. He was not so much surprised to see me as I had expected. I remarked this in Peggotty, too, when she came down; and I have seen it since; and I think, in the expectation of that dread surprise, all other changes and surprises dwindle into nothing.

I shook hands with Mr. Peggotty, and passed into the kitchen, while he softly closed the door. Little Em'ly was sitting by the

fire, with her hands before her face. Ham was standing near her.

We spoke in whispers; listening, between whiles, for any sound in the room above. I had not thought of it on the occasion of my last visit, but how strange it was to me now, to miss Mr. Barkis out of the kitchen!

"This is very kind of you, Mas'r Davy," said Mr. Peggotty. "It's oncommon kind," said Ham.

"See here! Here's

"Em'ly my dear," cried Mr. Peggotty.
What, cheer up, pretty!

Mas'r Davy come.
Mas'r Davy?"

Not a wured to

The

There was a trembling upon her that I can see now. coldness of her hand when I touched it, I can feel yet. Its only sign of animation was to shrink from mine; and then she glided from the chair, and, creeping to the other side of her uncle, bowed herself silently and trembling still, upon his breast.

"It's such a loving 'art," said Mr. Peggotty, smoothing her rich hair with his great hard hand," that it can't bear the sorrer of this. It's nat❜ral in young folk, Mas'r Davy, when they're new to these here trials, and timid, like my little bird-it's natʼral." She clung closer to him, but neither lifted up her face, nor spoke a word.

"It's getting late, my dear," said Mr. Peggotty, "and here's Ham come fur to take you home. Theer! Go along with t' other loving 'art! What, Em'ly? Eh, my pretty?"

The sound of her voice had not reached me, but he bent his head as if he listened to her, and then said:

"Let you stay with your uncle? Why, you don't mean to ask me that! Stay with your uncle, Moppet? When your husband that'll be so soon, is here fur to take you home? Now a person would n't think it, fur to see this little thing alongside a rough-weather chap like me," said Mr. Peggotty, looking round at both of us, with infinite pride; "but the sea ain't more salt in it than she has fondness in her for her uncle a foolish little Em❜ly!"

-

"Em'ly's in the right in that, Mas'r Davy!" said Ham. "Lookee here! As Em'ly wishes of it, and as she's hurried and frightened like, besides, I'll leave her till morning. Let me stay too!"

"You don't ought—a mar- to take and hull away a to watch and work both.

"No, no," said Mr. Peggotty. ried man like you, or what 's as good day's work. And you doen't ought

That won't do. You go home and turn in. You ain't afeerd of Em'ly not being took good care on, I know."

Ham yielded to this persuasion, and took his hat to go. Even when he kissed her and I never saw him approach her but I felt that nature had given him the soul of a gentleman she seemed to cling closer to her uncle, even to the avoidance of her chosen husband. I shut the door after him, that it might cause no disturbance of the quiet that prevailed; and when I turned back I found Mr. Peggotty still talking to her.

"Now, I'm agoing up-stairs to tell your aunt as Mas'r Davy's here, and that 'll cheer her up a bit," he said. "Sit ye down by the fire the while, my dear, and warm these mortal cold hands. You doen't need to be so fearsome, and take on so much. What? You'll go along with me? Well! come along with me-- come! If her uncle was turned out of a house and home, and forced to lay down in a dyke, Mas'r Davy," said Mr. Peggotty, with no less pride than before, "it's my belief she 'd go along with him, now! But there'll be some one else soon some one else soon,

Enly!”.

Afterward, when I went up-stairs, as I passed the door of my little chamber, which was dark, I had an indistinct impression of her being within it, cast down upon the floor. But, whether it was really she, or whether it was a confusion of the shadows in the room, I don't know now.

I had leisure to think, before the kitchen fire, of pretty little Em'ly's dread of death which, added to what Mr. Omer had told me, I took to be the cause of her being so unlike herself and I had leisure, before Peggotty came down, even to think more leniently of the weakness of it: as I sat counting the ticking of the clock, and deepening my sense of the solemn hush around me, Peggotty took me in her arms, and blessed and thanked me over and over again for being such a comfort to her (that was what she said) in her distress. She then entreated. me to come up-stairs, sobbing that Mr. Barkis had always liked me and admired me; that he had often talked of me, before he fell into a stupor; and that she believed, in case of his coming to himself again, he would brighten up at sight of me, if he could brighten up at any earthly thing.

The probability of his ever doing so appeared to me, when I saw him, to be very small. He was lying with his head and shoulders out of bed, in an uncomfortable attitude, half resting on the box which had cost him so much pain and trouble. I