"Will that do?" he said, handing the book to Eddy.
What a gush of gladness came to the child's face. A moment or two he stood, like one bewildered, and then throwing his arms around his father's neck and hugging him tightly, he said, in the fullness of his heart,
"Oh! you are a dear good papa! I do love you so much!"
Ere the arms of Eddy were unclasped from his father's neck, Mrs. Herbert had left the room. When, on the ringing of the dinner bell, she joined her husband and child at the table, her countenance wore a sober aspect, and there were signs of tears about her eyes. What her thoughts had been, every true mother can better imagine than we describe. That they were salutary, may be inferred from the fact that no promise, not even the lightest, was ever afterwards made to her child, which was not righteously kept to the very letter.
THE TWO HUSBANDS.
"Jane, how can you tolerate that dull, spiritless creature? I never sat by his side for five minutes, without getting sleepy."
"He does not seem so very dull to me, Cara," replied her companion.
"It is a true saying, that there never was a Jack without a Jill; but I could not have believed that my friend Jane Emory would have been willing to be the Jill to such a Jack."
A slight change was perceptible in the countenance of Jane Emory, and for a moment the color deepened on her cheek. But when she spoke in reply to her friend's remark, no indication that she felt its cutting import, was perceptible.