She obtained the key at the ferryman's house, and spent several hours roaming through the antique chambers, and laying plans by which each habitation might be made as comfortable as possible. There were six cottages in all, and a gate-house and chapel, enclosing a little mossy court, in whose centre lay a stone dolphin that spirted a thin jet of water into a mouldering sandstone tank. The highly-chevronned roof was covered with lead, which, spread by the heat of three hundred summers, hung over the eaves like a burden of slipping snow. The mullioned windows, which were still perfect, bore unbroken the quarterings of the Yarlstone arms with those of other noble East Anglian families. The living-rooms were panelled with oak; each with a carved screen near the door; and the chimney-pieces of elaborately-wrought alabaster displayed on their keystones the legend:-God Save Ye Bedefolke.

The chapel pleased her most; although it had been neglected for so long that when, after much striving her hands turned the key, and she stepped inward, her feet sank ankle-deep in the litter of swallows' and jackdaws' nests. It was only a small chamber, with a plain wooden altar and a few square pews, whose green baize cushions had long since rotted into dust; but the east window was full of marvellous stained glass, and the declining sun sent inward such a rich glory of color that her eyes were blinded after gazing for a moment on the face of the Infant Christ as He smiled from His mother's knee.

The Widow left the Almshouse at twilight, and on her way home called at the Squire's and asked for an interview. He was about to dine, and he begged her to join him, so that they might talk at ease; but it was only after much difficulty that he prevailed; the Widow proposing to come at some more convenient time. The Squire

forgot the lowliness of her position as he looked at her over the white cloth: she seemed to him like some old saint taken from a chronicle-save that saint could never have displayed such wonderful vivacity. It was only when the dessert was served that he would permit her to speak of serious business.

"Now," he said, "let us discuss this important matter. If it is anything that I can help with, I shall be glad."

The Widow smiled. "You can help," she replied, "not with money, but you can manage the affair for me, so that none will know that it is of my doing. You see, Squire, I'm getting an old woman now, and the loom is too heavy for me, and the time has come for me to sit in some quiet corner, with my hands folded in my lap."

"Ay," said the Squire, "it is right that you should rest; but as for being oldwhy there aren't many women of sixty as hale as you!"

She nodded. "That is true, Squire, and I mean to live as long as I can. But I'm going to cease working. It's foolish of me to beat about the bush, so I'll speak straight out—I've made up my mind to buy the old Yarlstone Almshouse, if I can get it."

"I

The Squire raised his eyebrows. heard that the reserve price is fifteen hundred," he said. "It will never sell for so much; besides,-can you—”

"I have the money," she interrupted. "The farm has let for a hundred a year since my husband's death, and not a penny of that money has been touched. And I've saved fifty pounds every year out of my own earnings. In all I've four thousand pounds in Fellbridge bank, and the land's still mine. So you see, Squire, God has prospered me and I'm a wealthy woman!”

"I don't know how you've contrived it," said the Squire, "for there isn't a soul in Fellbridge who doesn't regard you as the most generous person in the county."

Widow Ogden's cheeks colored faintly. "It is God's doing," she said; "the money is His!"'

"But what on earth do you want the old almshouse for?" he enquired, after a long pause; "you could never make it into a comfortable whole!"

"Why, Squire, you're not as witty as I thought!" she said, with a merry laugh. "I could chide you for not understanding. What I mean to do when I have bought the place, is to live in one of those cottages for the rest of my days."

"It won't do," began the Squire, indignantly, "it is your duty to have every possible comfort in your old age!"

"And I shall have everything that I need," she replied, "and so will the others who live there with me; for I'm going to endow the almshouse for five old women like myself, and draw my ten shillings a week just as they will."

The Squire coughed hoarsely and turned his head aside. "Confound it!" he said, "you're as mad as a March hare!"

"What I wish you to do is to arrange everything for me," she continued, "so that nobody may know till I'm dead and gone. The folk I shall choose-I have them in my mind now-are the widows or mothers of mariners who have died at sea. You know, Squire, that I suffered when my lad died, and God put it into my head that I might lighten the sufferings of other women, who had the burden of poverty, which I had not. And now, as the place is to be sold, and as I'm getting too feeble for work, it's time that the affair was settled. I have neither kith nor kin to murmur ... You'll do it for me, Squire?"

He took her wasted hand and pressed it warmly.

"I'll do whatever you wish," he said, in a broken voice; "you may trust me."

So in the course of time the Squire purchased the almshouse for an un

known person, and the roof was restored, and everything put into perfect order. Each house was furnished with all the things that housewives love. The Squire's own gardener worked for weeks in the court and garden; and by autumn the place was ready for the bede-folk.

The Widow gave up her stall and her loom to a crippled girl whom she had befriended and taught to weave skil fully during the last few months. She herself was the first to enter the resthouse. Her conduct excited great wonder in Fellbridge: it was surmised that she had lost all her possessions; and each of her friends strove to outdo the others in acts of kindness. Some wept for compassion; but the Widow's bland face and sparkling eyes reassured them, and ere long they rejoiced in her contentment.

On the second day of her sojourn there, the Squire drove down and found her sitting in the porch, nursing her cat. The other women were to come during the afternoon; and with her own hands she had lighted the fires and set the copper kettles on the hobs, so that all might be home-like.

He approached, hat in hand; she rose and curtsied to his bow. "I wanted to be your first visitor," he said. "Now that I've seen you here, I've no doubts about the wisdom you've shown. You look happier than ever, Widow Ogden. You'll permit me to visit your family sometimes?" "As often as you please, Squire," she replied mirthfully, "but you must promise not to patronize us poor sisters! We all mean to be independent, with never a care to darken our downhill walk!"

"I've been arranging about the chaplain," he remarked, after a while, "he will come every Sunday afternoon. The Bishop himself will preach sometimes. Of course he does not know the story; I wish that you had not determined to keep it secret: I feel as if

you were deprived of your right." "I care nought for that," said the Widow. "In sober earnest I want no praise just for my selfishness. I am giving myself a great joy."

She led the way indoors. Her home was furnished more plainly than the others; but all her old mementoes were there. The Squire sat opposite the bottle that contained the ship.

"You can tell folk when I'm laid with my husband," she said, "but even then let them make no fuss about it; or put any fresh stone or writing on the grave. I'd rather they didn't know even then; but so many are perplexed about what I've done with my money.

I wouldn't

for the world that any one got at the truth in my lifetime; my companions would feel no ease if they knew 'twas I who paid for them."

"Well, Widow, you are always right." replied the Squire. "I'll not urge you again. And now, since I see your Temple Bar.

friends coming through the gateway, I'll leave you to receive them."

But he lingered a while; for it was beautiful to watch the Widow as she led the other women one by one to their homes, and kissed them and spoke of the good fellowship that all would share.

"Everything is yours whilst you live," she said, "and Heaven grant that you may live long to enjoy it!"

And she wept as she heard them cry out with delight as they saw the comfort of their abiding-places; and her smiles shone through her tears when they handled the furniture so proudly.

So the Widow Ogden took upon herself a heavy share of the world's burden, and gloried in it, and bore it bravely until, dying, she left a name sweetened for the ages.

R. Murray Gilchrist.

The late Lady Burton, widow of the famous Sir Richard Burton, once remarked to me that she thought it "the height of discourtesy to leave letters unanswered, even letters from strangers." For this reason, though generally extremely busy, she made it a rule to set aside one whole day a week, which she spent in answering letters, many from persons she had never even heard of, and in glancing through books of many sorts and kinds sent to her by authors anxious to have her opinion. And she used to say that she considered letters received from total strangers to be among the most interesting she got.

In the pursuit of an avocation that necessitates my writing to persons of many sorts and conditions, and in many different ranks in life, and that, I am afraid, occasionally necessitates my

worrying strangers, I have for some years past been afforded opportunities of judging character, not by handwriting, for the great majority of busy men and women nowadays employ secretaries, but by the way in which letters are expressed. A great number of persons to whom I wrote in the first instance as a total stranger I have since come to know personally, and intimately, and in few cases indeed have I found that the opinion I had formed of these individuals, judging solely by the way they expressed themselves in their letters, had been a false opinion.

The letters I have received from persons to whom my name is, or was, quite unknown-and the total number of these letters runs into hundredsmay, broadly speaking, be divided into three sets; namely, the courteous, the discourteous, and the strictly formal.

And here let me say at once that I have found that, contrary to the popular belief, true courtesy has nothing whatever to do with good breeding. I have had letters from men and women who can trace their pedigrees back almost "so far that the memory of man runneth not to the contrary," that were courteous in the extreme in tone and style; but I have also many letters from persons of equally good breeding that only a man who at heart was a snob, or a sycophant, or a prig, could have written. Upon the other hand I find among the pile of letters before me as I write, communications from both men and women of very humble origin, but who have now risen to eminence, that for consideration, kindly feeling, and very great courtesy, could hardly be excelled. Indeed, upon comparing the one set with the other I find, to my astonishment, that the balance of courtesy rests with the latter. The letters that the least afford indications to their writers' characteristics, temperament, or peculiarities, are, of course, those communications that are of a strictly formal nature.

Though unable to speak from personal knowledge, I have it on the best of authority that the members of our Royal Family, and their immediate representatives, invariably adopt an extremely gracious tone when replying to letters of inquiry on matters of general interest, which is what one might have expected. The many members of Parliament to whom I have, from first to last, had occasion to write, have almost all answered by return of post and in a very friendly way. Not so a great many Army officers, and I do not recollect ever receiving from any one of the gentlemen until recently connected with our War Office, a letter, in reply to an inquiry, that was not more or less brusque. Indeed it was from a gentleman indirectly connected with the War Office when the late Government was

in power that I received the following message written across a letter that I had sent to him: "Sir, I have looked in 'Debrett' but cannot find your name there," an unkind cut, seeing that I had not hinted at being so honored. Naval officers, on the contrary, generally write in a very courteous tone-short, concise letters, that go straight to the point. When disinclined or unable to supply the information asked for they say so straightforwardly and have done with it. Naturally it must be borne in mind that I am speaking now of bodies of men collectively. There are exceptions in every instance.

The following letters form an example of the striking contrast there is in the way men answer inquiries put to them civilly. I had been commissioned to write an article on a question of some importance at the time I applied to them, and to obtain as much expert opinion upon the subject as possible. The letters I addressed to the various men I deemed in a position to furnish the information I needed were to all intents and purposes identical. It is not difficult to read between the lines the temperament of the man who wrote the following reply:

I shall have great pleasure in doing what you ask. This week, unfortunately, I am more than ordinarily busy; but you shall hear from me early in next week.

Nor the manner of the man who wrote the following in reply to the same inquiry:

I am not aware that I have the privilege of your acquaintance, and I decline absolutely to grant your impertinent request.

It was in reply to a similar letter of inquiry that the following answer reached me:

The enclosed slip contains the expression of my views upon the matter re

ferred to in your letter, and I take this opportunity of thanking you for the compliment you pay me in desiring my opinion.

And the following:

de

In answer to your letter, sires me to say that he is not in the habit of conferring favors upon strange gentlemen.

A lady I employed as secretary was directly responsible for the following two gems, which speak for themselves. Through an oversight she had addressed the letter intended for, let us call him Mr. Brown-though his name was not Brown-to Mr. Browne. By return of post Mr. Brown wrote:

I really am much too busy to answer letters from strangers, more especially from men who know so little about me as to write my name with an "e."

The other was yet more whimsical:

Sir John Smith presents his compliments, and wishes me to say that he is not in the habit of corresponding with lunatics.

Enclosed was the envelope that had contained my letter. It ought to have been addressed to Sir John Smith, Bart. Instead, the address, which was type-written, appeared, Sir John Smith, Rats. When I drew my secretary's attention to this trifling error in spelling she became almost hysterical. She declared that she had been very tired, and that when you become tired your type-writing machine is apt to take strange liberties-a statement that all who use a type-writing machine will know to be true. Consequently it was not until some weeks later, when a descriptive report of the movements of a great fog in the Channel, that I had dictated to her, appeared in the typoscript with the weird heading, "Great egg in the Channel," that I deemed it expedient to seek another assistant.

I could quote many more letters that

serve to indicate the peculiarities of their writers' natures, but the foregoing will suffice for the moment. It is a curious yet indisputable fact, however, that quite a considerable section of the educated community is firmly imbued with the belief that a brusque, arrogant manner denotes strength of character. What can first have given rise to this erroneous supposition it is difficult to conceive. My own experience and observation lead me to conIclude just the reverse. Almost all our successful organizers, pioneers in commerce, politicians, statesmen, literary men, lawyers, doctors, financiers, actors, artists of all kinds, are courteous in the extreme, and their courtesy is in most instances revealed in the tone of the letters they have occasion to write to persons with whom they are not acquainted. The successful men who lack courtesy have succeeded in spite of their unfortunate personality, not because of it. It was no less successful a man than Sir Alfred Jones who said to me only recently, "In these times no man has a right to be, or can afford to be, discourteous"; and as an after-thought he added, "even to his office boy."

The idea, prevalent in certain circles, that the newly-rich constitute, as a body, the least considerate if not the most snobbish and purse-proud class, is not borne out by facts. The remark made lately by a well-known diplomatist that "no snob is really so snobbish as a well-bred snob," is probably one of the truest of utterances. Judging by the tone of his letters, the modern man of humble origin, who has amassed wealth through his individual industry, is businesslike and methodical, but he is seldom overbearing. His shortcomings are a tendency to be patronizing, and generally a lack of humor, the latter characteristic possibly denoting that Dr. John Watson (Ian Maclaren) was right when he recently pronounced a