'May we go up, Ma'am ?' 'Oh! he'll be overjoyed, gentlemen, to see you, and 'twill do him an infinity of good.

I can scarce believe my eyes.

We've been tidying the study, the maid and I, and airing the cushions of his chair;' and she laughed a delighted little giggle.

'And even the weather has taken up such beautiful sunshine; everything favourable.' 'Well, Doctor Sturk,' said Toole, cheerily, 'we have a good account of you--a vastly good account, doctor; and, by St.George, Sir, we've been tidying--' He was going to say the study, but little Mrs.Sturk put her finger to her lip in a wonderful hurry, raising her eyebrows and drawing a breath through her rounded lips, in such sort as arrested the sentence; for she knew how Barney's wrath always broke out when he thought the women had been in his study, and how he charged every missing paper for a month after upon their cursed meddling.

But Sturk was a good deal gentler now, and had a dull and awful sort of apathy upon him; and I think it was all one to him whether the women had been in the study or not.