were stings and patronage poison. He could not laugh at the enemy and scorn discomfiture as Dolly could, and the consequence of an encounter with the Philistines on his part was usually a desperate fit of low spirits, which made him wretched, bitter, and gloomy by turns.     

       This morning it appeared that his spirits had reached their lowest ebb, and before many minutes had passed he was pouring forth his tribulations with much frankness and simplicity. Mr. Griffith Donne's principal trial was the existence of an elderly maiden aunt, who did not approve of him, and was in the habit of expressing her disapproval in lengthy epistolary correspondence, invariably tending to severe denunciation of his mode of life, and also invariably terminating with the announcement that unless he       “desisted” (from what, or in what manner, not specified) she should consider it her bounden duty to disinherit him forthwith. One of these periodical epistles, having arrived before he had breakfasted, had rather destroyed Griffith's customary equanimity, and various events of the morning had not improved his frame of mind; consequently he came to Dolly for comfort.     

       “And she's coming to London, too,” he ended, after favoring the assemblage with extracts from the letter. “And, of course, she will expect me to do the dutiful. Confound her money! I wish she would build an asylum for irate, elderly spinsters with it, and retire into it for the remainder of her natural life. I don't want it, and"—with praiseworthy ingenuousness—"I shouldn't get it if I did!”      

       “But,” said Dolly, when they found themselves alone for a few minutes, “it would be an agreeable sort of thing to have, Griffith, upon the whole, wouldn't it?”      

       They were standing close together by the fire, Griffith with his arm thrown round the girl's waist, and she with both her plump, flexible hands clasped on his shoulder and her chin resting on them, and her big, round eyes gazing up into his. She was prone to affectionate, nestling attitudes and coaxing ways—with Griffith it may be understood—her other adorers were treated cavalierly enough.     

       “A nice sort of thing,” echoed Griffith. “I should think it would. I should like to have it for your sake. I don't care for it so much for myself, you know, Dolly, but I want the time to come when I can 

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