hurrying upstairs, while she exhibited stair-rods and carpets, and with shortened breath apostrophized them as being "real brass" or "the best Brussels at five-and-threepence."  No one is vulgar in Stowel, but Mrs. Lovekin is, we fear, not genteel. 

 At the close of the visit, Mrs. Lovekin again ushered the visitors into the hall, and opening, "by the merest accident," as she afterwards said—without, however, gaining any credence for her statement—opening by the merest accident the door of the drawing-room, she peeped in. 

 The drawing-room was void of furniture. The wild thought came into Mrs. Lovekin's mind—had the Traceys overbuilt themselves, and had the furniture, which had been carried so proudly through the town on the top of the furniture-van, been sold to pay expenses? The suggestion was immediately put aside. The Miss Traceys' comfortable means were so well known that such an explanation could not be seriously contemplated for a moment. No; putting two and two together, a closed spare bedroom and an empty drawing-room, and bringing a woman's instinct to bear upon the question, it all pointed to one thing—the Miss Traceys were going to give a party, probably an evening party, in honour of the new house, and the drawing-room furniture was being stored for safety in the spare bedroom until the rout was over. Doubtless the first rumour of the Miss Traceys' party was meanly come by, but it was none the less engrossing, all the same. Miss Lydia hoped that no one would believe for a moment that she was in any way connected with the fraudulent intrusion that had been made into Miss Tracey's secret, and Miss Tracey said,— 

 "I have known Mary Anne Lovekin for thirty years"—this was understating the case, but numbers are not exactly stated as we grow older—"but I never would have believed that she could have done such a thing." 

 "Bad butter," said Miss Belinda, shaking her head in an emphatic fashion; "bad butter, bad butter!" 

 "I do not want to judge people," said Miss Tracey; "but there was a want of delicacy about opening a closed door which I for one cannot forgive."  The Miss Traceys' good-breeding is proverbial in Stowel, and it was felt that her uncompromising attitude could not but be excused when it was a matter of her most honourable sensibilities having been outraged. 

 "I shall not say what I think," said Miss Ruby. 

 We often find that when Miss Ruby cannot transcend what her sister has said, 

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