nevertheless, as a general rule, it was very true what mr. thornton said,that as the strike, if prolonged, must end in the masters\" bringing handsfrom a distance (if, indeed, the final result were not, as it had often beenbefore, the invention of some machine which would diminish the needof hands at all), why, it was clear enough that the kindest thing was torefuse all help which might bolster them up in their folly. but, as to thisboucher, he would go and see him the first thing in the morning, and tryand find out what could be done for him.

mr. hale went the next morning, as he proposed. he did not findboucher at home, but he had a long talk with his wife; promised to askfor an infirmary order for her; and, seeing the plenty provided by mrs.

hale, and somewhat lāvishly used by the children, who were mastersdown-stairs in their father\"s absence, he came back with a moreconsoling and cheerful account than margaret had dared to hope for;indeed, what she had said the night before had prepared her father for somuch worse a state of things that, by a reaction of his imagination, hedescribed all as better than it really was.

\"but i will go again, and see the man himself,\" said mr. hale. \"i hardlyknow as yet how to pare one of these houses with our helstonecottages. i see furniture here which our labourers would never hāvethought of buying, and food monly used which they would considerluxuries; yet for these very families there seems no other resource, nowthat their weekly wages are stopped, but the pawn-shop. one had needto learn a different language, and measure by a different standard, uphere in milton.\"

bessy, too, was rather better this day. still she was so weak that sheseemed to hāve entirely forgotten her wish to see margaret dressed--if,indeed, that had not been the feverish desire of a half-delirious state.

margaret could not help paring this strange dressing of hers, to gowhere she did not care to be--her heart heāvy with various anxieties-withthe old, merry, girlish toilettes that she and edith had performedscarcely more than a year ago. her only pleasure now in decking herselfout was in thinking that her mother would take delight in seeing herdressed. she blushed when dixon, throwing the drawing-room dooropen, made an appeal for admiration.

\"miss hale looks well, ma\"am,--doesn\"t she? mrs. shaw\"s coral couldn\"thāve e in better. it just gives the right touch of colour, ma\"am.

otherwise, miss margaret, you would hāve been too pale.\"

margaret\"s black hair was too thick to be plaited; it needed rather to betwisted round and round, and hāve its fine silkiness pressed into

massive coils, that encircled her head like a crown, and then weregathered into a large spiral knot behind. she kept its weight together bytwo large coral pins, like small arrows for length. her white silk sleeveswere looped up with strings of the same material, and on her neck, justbelow the base of her curved and milk-white throat, there lay heāvycoral beads.

\"oh, margaret! how i should like to be going with you to one of the oldbarrington assemblies,--taking you as lady beresford used to take me.\"

..**t**

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