spent there, was it uncovered. Everything in it was kept in bibs and pinafores. Even the carpet was covered with a cold and slippery sheet of brown holland. Mr. Hetheridge never entered that room, and therein was wise. James remonstrated once. She answered him quite kindly, even playfully, but no change followed. What was worse, she made very wretched tea. Her father never took tea; neither did James. I was rather fond of it, but I soon gave it up. Everything her father partook of was first-rate. Everything else was somewhat poverty-stricken. My pleasure in Laetitia’s society prevented me from making practical deductions from such trifles.”
“I shouldn’t have thought you knew anything about eating, uncle,” said Janet.
“The less a man eats, the more he likes to have it good, Janet. In short—there can be no harm in saying it now—Laetitia was so far from being like the name of her baptism—and most names are so good that they are worth thinking about; no children are named after bad ideas—Laetitia was so far unlike hers as to be stingy—an abominable fault. But, I repeat, the notion of such a fact was far from me then. And now for my story.
“The first of November was a very lovely day, quite one of the ‘halcyon days’ of ‘ St. Martin’s summer.’ I was