late.

"Kaituna," cried Tommy, attracted by the laugh, "why are you sitting in the corner like a graven image? Come out and sing."

"No, I don't want to. I'm waiting for my letter."

"Hasn't it arrived yet?" said Miss Valpy, skipping across the room. "I'd give it to that Dombrain thing if I were you. Dombrain! What a name! Who is he?"

"My father's solicitor."

"Oh, in the law and the profits? I don't mean biblically, but commercially. But, I say, don't keep thinking of your letter, or it won't come. The watched postman never boils."

"What nonsense you talk!"

"I can't help it, dear. My brains leave me when there are no male things in the room."

"There's Mr. Spons."

"Oh, I don't bother about him. He's not a man; he's a medicine bottle. Hark! I hear footmarks approaching on horseback. It is the man. Now, will you take Mr. Clendon and I Mr. Maxwell, or will you take Mr. Maxwell and I Mr. Clendon?"

"I don't want either," said Kaituna hastily.

"Now that's ungrateful, especially when Mr. Maxwell is such a dear. 'Oh, that heaven would send me such a man!'--Shakespeare, Kaituna, so don't look indignant. You can take Archie, and I'll satisfy myself with Toby."

"You shouldn't call men by their Christian names, Thomasina."

"Don't say that; it sounds like 'ma. I only call them by their Christian names to you. I wouldn't do it to their faces."

"I hope not."

"How proper you are! Behold the male sex are at the door! I can smell the tobacco on their clothes."

The rattle of the lively damsel was put an end to by the entry of the gentlemen, headed by Maxwell and Clendon, the latter of whom Miss Valpy bore off at once to the piano to make him sing, turn over her music, and make himself generally useful. Maxwell, however, went straight across to Kaituna, and held out a newspaper.

"This is yours, Miss Pethram," he said, seating himself beside her, "I knew you were anxious about the post, so I 

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