The foster-sisters

by Lucy Ellen Guernsey

It seemed for a time, however, that my auguries were likely to prove false, and that Amabel's course of true love was like to run smooth. Just about Christmas time Mr. Cheriton paid us a visit, bringing letters from Sir Julius to Mrs. Deborah and to Amabel herself. Sir Julius wrote very kindly to his daughter. He said she was rather young to marry, and must wait at least a year, but as Mr. Cheriton was a man of good family, and had a competent fortune beside his living, and a likelihood of church preferment, he should make no objection to his paying his addresses to his daughter.

What he wrote to Mrs. Deborah I don't know, but she received Mr. Cheriton very politely, even though he and his family were known for steadfast adherents to the reigning dynasty, and hoped she should have the pleasure of seeing his father and mother at Highbeck Hall during the Christmas season.

They came accordingly—he, a venerable, kind old man, very sincerely religious in his fashion, and though a little perplexed as to his son's new-fangled ways, as he called them, yet quite willing to accept them, and believe they must be good because Walter said so; she, the very model of a Lady Bountiful, a perfect housekeeper, a famous concoctor of syrups, draughts, and emulsions, of broth and brewis, the kind if somewhat arbitrary friend of the poor. She had not been in the house two hours, before she had propounded at least a dozen different remedies for Aunt Chloe's cough, from bread jelly with lemon-peel and raisins, to a couple of snails boiled in her tea-water. This last was confided in a whisper to Aunt Deborah, as it was essential to the cure that the patient should know nothing about it.

Both these good people took very kindly to Amabel, and invited us both to visit them. Mrs. Cheriton presented Amabel with a pair of pearl ear-rings which had been given herself on her wedding day, and promised her some silver which had been in the family three hundred years at least. (Did any one ever hear of an heirloom which had been in a family for less than three hundred years?) The subject of politics was kept out of sight by mutual consent, so we all parted excellent friends.

Mr. Cheriton returned to his parish in Newcastle, where, he told us, matters were going very much to his satisfaction. He had succeeded in establishing the weekly lecture on which he had set his heart; and it was well attended. He had also set up classes for the young women and elder girls, where they read good books and perfected themselves in various useful works, and in these Mrs. Thorpe was giving him very efficient help. He was on the best of terms with the rector of St. Nicholas, an old gentleman who was nearly or quite blind, but an excellent man and a good clergyman. This gentleman had been away during the whole of our stay in Newcastle, and we had more than once heard it said that on his return he would put a spoke in Mr. Cheriton's wheel; so that it was a great pleasure to hear that though he did not exactly approve of all Mr. Cheriton's doings, and thought him rather over-zealous, he made no active opposition to him.

Mr. Cheriton also told us another thing which we found it hard to believe—namely, that he was quite sure he had seen Father Brousseau at one of Mr. Wesley's out-of-door preachings he had attended not long before. He said he had not known how to believe his own eyes at first, but he had watched him and was quite sure it was the same person he had seen at Mrs. Thorpe's shop.

"How very strange!" said Amabel. "How did he look?"

"He seemed very much affected, I thought!" replied Mr. Cheriton. "At first, he pulled his hat down and kept his cloak up as if he were afraid of being seen, but toward the last he seemed too much interested in the discourse to think about concealment. But I can tell you news of another friend, which will surprise you yet more!" he added smiling. "Mrs. Cropsey is married!"

"Married!" we both exclaimed not very civilly! "Not married already! Why, her husband has not been dead a year, and she could never speak of him without crying."

"Exactly!" replied Mr. Cheriton drily. "She did up all her grief at once. She was married very privately by license more than two months ago to old Mr. Arnott the great ship owner, but it is owned now, and she presides over his fine house with great dignity."