"And you don't think it looks very worldly," said Caroline, with a long, sidelong loving look in the glass, "you don't think that Miss Ash, or Mrs. Warren, or Mr. Barrett-"

"I think that, at all events, we must not pull it off now," said Ruth; "your hair would have to be dressed over again; the carriage may come at any moment, and it would never do to keep Major Earle and Alice waiting."

"Ah! and now I remember Alice gave me this head-dress, I am actually obliged to wear it," said Caroline, in a tone of relief; "I am glad you put me in mind of that, Ruth, for if Miss Ash should make any remark about my head-dress, I can so easily explain how I come to wear it. She will see at once that it would not be right in me to appear to slight Alice's presents."

"I do not suppose Alice recollects that she gave it you, or that she will observe whether

you have it on or not," said Ruth.

"But,

Caroline, I wish you would come down before you put your hood on, to let mamma see you."

"Aunt Harriet!" objected Caroline.

"She has not come in yet."

Caroline seemed to find it rather difficult to tear herself away from the glass; she looked again, with the complacency that was excusable, perhaps, in a young girl of eighteen, to whom it was still a great event to be dressed for an evening party.

"Ruth," she said suddenly, turning from the brilliant reflection she had been studying, "what do you think the Ashes say of me?" "Which of them?"

"It does not signify which; they say-one of them-William says, that I am exactly like our cousin, Alice Earle."

"Not exactly like," said Ruth, after giving her sister's face a studying look; certainly not exactly like; but I don't think it signi

fies; for some people-such people as William Ash-will think you handsomer than Alice Earle; for you are taller, and rather stouter, and your hair is a little yellower, and your eyes bluer, and your cheeks redder, and there is more to see in you altogether; I wish you would come down for mamma to see."

"Do you know, they say, that in London, everyone called Alice the lovely Miss Earle," said Caroline, with a farewell-look in the glass; and she followed her sister, wondering, as she walked down the dark staircase, whether the time had come at last for people to begin calling her the lovely Miss Brandon.

She was so much occupied with the thought that she did not hear Ruth remark upon the dreadful litter that the children had made on the stairs, while they had been busy; and when she entered the down-stairs' room where her mother sat, she did not notice what Ruth saw at the first glance, that the fire had wanted renewing for some time; that the candle on the

table burned with a long melancholy unsnuffed wick; and that each of Mrs. Brandon's pale cheeks wore the burning red spot that was always called there by nervous watching.

"Oh! I am glad," she said, letting her head fall back on the sofa-pillow, from which it had been partly raised in a listening attitude, so glad that you are really in time.

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I thought I heard the carriage coming up the street, and I felt afraid that you would keep your uncle waiting. If I could have made Susan, or Tom, or Arthur hear me, I should have sent one of them to tell you to come down."

"You always think that we shall be late, and you know we never are, mamma," said Caroline.

"Well! perhaps, I am impatient," her mother answered, wearily, "but I have been so uneasy; I thought I heard Tom tumbling down the stairs; there was a dreadful noise just now, and I thought it might be his head."

"Dear mamma, you are always thinking so, and it never is Tom's head," said Caro

line, not crossly, but in a piqued tone of voice. She was disappointed that her mother did not find something else to say.

Ruth, in the meantime, had stirred the fire, and snuffed the long candle.

"Now, mamma, look at Caroline," she said.

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'Yes, my dear, very nice, indeed," said Mrs. Brandon.

She tried hard to smile as she looked, but it was a melancholy attempt at a smile; the pale lips were trembling too nervously, and the long, thin fingers were still clasped tightly together.

"It is such a pity that you will fidget yourself so sadly about little things, mamma," said Caroline.

"The carriage, my dear," exclaimed Mrs. Brandon, starting up. "Yes, I do hear it coming now. Ruth, run for her hood, put