“Now shall I put a stop to this, or shall I let it be?” thought John; and he proceeded to read Crayshaw’s effusion.

     TO G.M.  IN HER BRONZE BOOTS

     As in the novel skippers say,
     “Shiver my timbers!” and “Belay!”
     While a few dukes so handy there
     Respectfully make love or swear;

     As in the poem some great ass
     For ever pipes to his dear lass;
     And as in life tea crowns the cup
     And muffins sop much butter up;

     So, naturally, while I walk
     With you, I feel a swell—­and stalk—­
     Consecutively muttering “Oh,
     I’m quite a man, I feel I grow.”

     But loudliest thumps this heart to-day,
     While in the mud you pick your way,
     (You fawn, you flower, you star, you gem,)
     In your new boots with heels to them.

     Your Eldest Slave.

“I don’t consider these verses a bit more consecutive than Conyngham’s talk,” said John, laughing.

“Well, father, then he shouldn’t say such things!  He said Mr. Brandon walked with an infallible stride, and that you were the most consecutive of any one he had ever met with.”

“But, my dear little girl, Crayshaw would not have known that unless you had told him; do you think that was the right thing to do by a guest?”

Gladys blushed.  “But, father,” said Barbara, “I suppose Cray may come now; Conyngham goes to-morrow.  Cray never feels so well as when he is here.”

“I had no intention of inviting him this Christmas,” answered John.

“Well,” said Gladys, “it doesn’t make much difference; he and Johnnie can be together just the same nearly all day, because his brother and Mrs. Crayshaw are going to stay with the Brandons, and Cray is to come too.”

John felt as if the fates were against him.

“And his brother was so horribly vexed when he found that he hardly got on at school at all.”

“That’s enough to vex any man.  Cray should spend less time in writing these verses of his.”

“Yes, he wrote us word that his brother said so, and was extremely cross and unpleasant, when he replied that this was genius, and must not be repressed.”

John, after this, rode into the town, and as he stopped his horse to pay the turnpike, he was observed by the turnpike-keeper’s wife to be looking gloomy and abstracted; indeed, the gate was no sooner shut behind him than he sighed, and said with a certain bitterness, “I shouldn’t wonder if, in two or three years time, I am driven to put my neck under the yoke after all.”

“No, we can’t come,” said little Hugh, when a few days after this Emily and Dorothea drove over and invited the children to spend the day, “we couldn’t come on any account, because something very grand is going to happen.”

“Did you know,” asked Anastasia, “that Johnnie had got into the shell?”