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"Entirely," she answered decisively. "Then I may tell you that no former will has been found, and she is next of kin. There are no other relations at all, I believe, and she will therefore inherit about three times as much as if the burned will had remained in existence." "Really!"— and Mrs. North clapped her hands for joy. And then the tears came into her eyes. "Oh, but it is too late, for she is dying; nothing can save her; she is dying. I have telegraphed to her nephew and niece to come back from Monte Carlo. She has had a terrible shock, from which she will never recover; and besides that she has virtually starved herself and taken a hundred colds. She has not the strength of a fly left. I know she is dying," Mrs. North added, with a sob she could not help. "Don't you think that the good news I bring might save her life?"

"No; and I am not sure that it would be good to save it, she has suffered so cruelly. What a wicked old man Sir William Rammage was!" she burst out, and looked up sympathetically at Mr. Boughton.

"He was my client," the lawyer urged. "He allowed the poor old lady to starve for want of money, and now that he is dead and she is dying it comes to her." "Yes, it is very unfortunate very unfortunate."

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"It is quite impossible; you would remind her of your horrible nephew, and that would kill her."

"What on earth has she got to do with my nephew?" and this time his manner convinced Mrs. North that he was not an impostor.

"Mr. Boughton," she said gravely, "the old lady is very, very ill. The doctor says she cannot live, and I fear that the sight of you would kill her straight off; but, if you like, I will go and sound her, and find out if she is strong enough to bear a visit from you "— and, the lawyer having agreed to this, Mrs. North went up-stairs.

"Dearest old lady "—her girlish voice had always a tender note in it when she spoke to Aunt Anne. "I have some good news for you — very good news. Do you think you could bear to hear it?"

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"Yes, my love," Aunt Anne answered wheezily, but you must forgive me if I am sceptical as to its goodness."

Mrs. North knelt down by the bedside, and stroked the thin hands. "Mr. Boughton is down-stairs; he has come to tell you that Sir William Rammage is dead."

"Then it is true," Mrs. Baines said sadly. "Poor William! My dear, we once lay in the same cradle together, while our mothers watched beside it. What does Mr. Boughton say about Alfred?" "He doesn't appear to know anything about his wickedness."

"I felt sure he did not; I never believed in the depravity of human nature."

"Then how would you account for Mr. Wimple?" she asked, with much interest. The old lady considered for a moment.

"Perhaps he was my punishment for all I did in the past. I have thought that lately, and tried to bear it only it is more than I can bear. It has humiliated me too much. Tell me why Mr. Boughton has come; is it anything about Alfred ?"

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Nothing," was the emphatic answer; and if you see him I advise you not to mention Mr. Wimple's name."

Everything seems to be a point of view," Mrs. North went on, in the eager manner which so often characterized her." "Poverty is the point of view from which we look at riches we cannot get; from vice we look at virtue which we cannot attain; from hell we look at the heaven we cannot reach. Perhaps Sir William Rammage would appreciate the latter part of the

"My dear," Aunt Anne said impressively, "except to yourself, his name will never pass my lips again. I feel that it is desecration to my dear Walter and Florence to mention it in their house. I shall

never forgive myself for having brought | niary obligation I shall still remain your him into it. But perhaps all I have suf- debtor. But there are some things I fered is some expiation; you and I have should like to do. I wish Mrs. North to both felt that about our frailty" - and have a sum of money; I will tell her my she shook her head. "What is the good wishes in regard to it." news?"

"Mr. Boughton brought it, and it is about Sir William's money." Mrs. Baines was silent for a moment; then she looked up, with a little wink, and a smile came to her lips. "I should like to see him," she said. "But will you help me to get up first? I think if I could sit by the open window I should be better."

"Perhaps you would, you dear; it's warm enough for summer. Let me help you into your dressing-gown. Stay, you shall wear mine. It is very smart, with lavender bows; quite proper half-mourning for a cousin. There -now-gently " -and she helped the old lady into the easy-chair by the window. It was a long business, but at last she was safely there, with the sunshine falling on her, and the soft lace and lavender ribbons of Mrs. North's dressing-gown about her poor old neck.

"And are you sure it's good news, my love?" she asked Mrs. North.

"I am quite sure," Mrs. North answered, as she tucked an eider-down quilt round Aunt Anne. "He has come from London on purpose to bring it to you."

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Has he partaken of any refreshment since he arrived?"

"No; but I will have some ready for him when he comes down from his talk with you. Now you shall have your têteà-tête" and Mrs. North went back to the lawyer.

"You must break it to her very, very gently, and you mustn't be more than five or ten minutes with her," she said, as she took him up to the bedroom door.

Aunt Anne was so much fatigued with the exertion of getting up that she found it a hard matter to receive Mr. Boughton with all the courtesy she desired to show him. She took the news of her fortune very quietly; it did not even excite her.

"It is too late," she said. "Nothing can solace me for what I have lost; but it will enable me to make provision for my dear Walter and Florence." Her eyes closed; her head sank on her breast; she put out her hand towards the window, as if to clutch at something that was not there.

Mr. Boughton saw it, and understood. "I cannot repay you for your kindness and consideration," she went on presently. "Even when I have discharged my pecu

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"Perhaps I had better return in a day or two. You must forgive me for saying, my dear madam, that, with the vast sum that is now at your disposal, you ought to make a will immediately. I could take instructions now if you like.”

"Instructions?" she repeated, with a puzzled air; "I will give them all to Mrs. North, and you can take them from her. You will not think me inhospitable if I ask you to leave me now, Mr. Boughton? I am very tired. Tell me, did they send for you when William Rammage died?"

"They telegraphed for me immediately, and when I got to the office I found your letter waiting for me the one you wrote before you left London, giving me your address here." She did not hear him; her eyes had closed again, and her chin rested down on the lavender ribbons; the sunshine came in and lighted up her face, and that which Mr. Boughton saw written on it was unmistakable.

"You are quite right, my dear madam,” he said to Mrs. North, as he sat partaking of the refreshment Aunt Anne had devised for him; "it has come too late."

He looked at his watch when he had

finished. "I have only a quarter of an hour to stay," he said. "Before I go, would you give me some explanation of the extraordinary statements you made on my arrival?"

"You shall have it," Mrs. North answered eagerly; "but wait one moment, till I have taken this egg and wine to Mrs. Baines and seen that the maid is with her."

"That's a remarkably handsome girl," the lawyer thought, when she had disappeared; "I wonder where I have heard her name before, and who she is?" But this speculation was entirely forgotten when he heard the story of his nephew's doings of the last few months. "God bless my soul!" he exclaimed; "why, he might be sent to prison with hard labor and serve him right, the scoundrel!"

I am

"I am delighted to hear you say it," Mrs. North answered impulsively. "Please shake hands with me. ashamed to say I thought it all a conspiracy, even after you came, and that is why I was so disagreeable."

"Conspiracy, my dear madam? - why, the last thing I did to Wimple was to kick him out of my office; and I have been worried by his duns ever since. As for

the will she made in his favor, get it destroyed at once or he may give us no end of trouble yet. She has virtually given me instructions for a new one. I told her I would come in a day or two, but I think it would be safer to come to-morrow. It will have to be rather late in the day, I am afraid, but I can sleep at the inn. In the mean time get the other will destroyed. Why, bless me! if she died to-night it might make an awful scandal; I would not have it happen for all I am worth."

Mr. Boughton departed; and the doctor came, and gave so bad a report that Mrs. North sent off yet another telegram to Walter and Florence—this time to London asking them not to waste a moment on their arrival, but to come straight to Witley. And then the second post brought her the morning's letters which had been sent on. Among them was one with the Naples post-mark, which she tore open with feverish haste and could scarcely read for tears of joy.

"I could not write before,” it said. "I am detained here by a friend's illness; but now that I am thus far I send you just a line to say I shall be with you soon, and I shall never leave you again. I hate to think it all. The fault was mine, and the suffering has been yours. But I love you, and only live to make you reparation."

"It is too much happiness to bear," she said, with a sob. "It is all I wanted that he should love me I must write this minute, or he will wonder" — and she got out her blotting-case, just as she did at the hotel at Marseille-it seemed as if that scene had been a suggestion of this and, kneeling down by the table, wrote: — "I am here with Mrs. Baines, and she

is dying. I have just-just had your letter. Oh, the joy of it! What can I say, you know everything that is in my heart better than words can write it down."

or do?

She sealed it up; and, seizing her hat, went once round the garden, for the cottage seemed too small a house to hold so great a happiness as that which had come upon her. She looked up to the sky, and thought how blessed it was to be beneath it, and away at the larches and fir-trees, and wondered if he and she would ever walk between them. Something told her that they would if if all came right, if she found that he loved her so much that he could not live without her. They would lead such ideal lives; they would do their very best for every one, and make

so many people happy, and cover up the past with all the good that love would surely put it into their hearts to do. "It would be too much to bear," she said to herself; "it is too much to think of yet — I will go back to my dear old lady, and comfort her."

Aunt Anne was much better for her interview with Mr. Boughton. The excitement had done her good, and some of her little consequential ways had returned with the knowledge of her wealth.

"I am glad to see you, my love," she said to Mrs. North; “I have many things to discuss with you if you will permit me to encroach on your good-nature. Would you mind sitting down on the footstool again beside me, as you did yesterday?" The maid had lifted her on to the oldfashioned sofa at the foot of the bed. She was propped up with pillows, and looked so well and comfortable it seemed almost possible that she might live.

"I will," Mrs. North answered, still overcome with her own thoughts — “I will sit at your feet, and receive your royal commands. But first permit me to say that you are looking irresistible - my lavender ribbons give you a most ravishing appearance."

You are in excellent spirits," Aunt Anne said, with a pleased smile; "and so am I," she added. "It has done me a world of good to hear that William Rammage's iniquitous intentions have been frustrated."

"I trust he is aware of it," Mrs. North answered, "and that his soul is delightfully vexed by the enterprising Satan."

"My love," said the old lady with a shocked wink, " 'you hardly understand the purport of your own words."

ically, "but now I want to speak about "Yes, I do," Mrs. North said emphatsomething much more important. I hope you are going to get well—yes, in spite of all the shakes of your dear old head; and that you are going to live to be a hundred and one, in order to scold me with very long words when I offend you."

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"I will endeavor to do so, my love; but I hope that some one else will do it better ". - she stopped and closed her eyes. "I believe you are a witch, and you know about my letter. It has just come, and has made me so happy," Mrs. North said, between laughing and crying.

"What does he say?" the old lady asked, without opening her eyes.

"He says he is coming," Mrs. North answered, almost in a whisper. "It's almost more than I can bear. I think it

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"I am told that he is casting his eyes on an amiable lady of forty-five. She is the sister of an eminent Q. C., has read Buckle's History of Civilization,' and her favorite fad is the abolition of capital punishment. But I don't want to talk of my affairs, Aunt Anne, I want to talk of yours - they are more momentous." Mrs. North prided herself on picking up Aunt Anne's words, and using them with great discretion.

"Yes, my love, I am most grateful to you."

"I am certain as I tell you - that you are going to live and get well." Mrs. North meant her words at the moment, for, with the sweet insolence of youth, she was incredulous of death until it was absolutely before her eyes. "But at the same time," she went on, "now that you are enormously rich, you ought to take precautions in case of an accident. If the cottage were burned down to-night, and we were burned with it, who would inherit your money?"

"I told Mr. Boughton that I would give my instructions to you, and he is coming the day after to-morrow."

"But have you destroyed the will you made in favor of Alfred Wimple?"

would not be legal; besides, I am rich enough, you kind old lady. Shall I begin?"

"Stop one moment, my dear; will you give me a little sal volatile first, and let me rest for five minutes?" She closed her eyes, but it was not to sleep; she appeared to be thinking of something that disturbed her. When she looked up again she was almost panting with excitement as well as weakness, and there was the fierce, yet frightened, look in her eyes that had been in them when she opened the front door to turn Alfred Wimple out of the house.

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Yes," Mrs. North said, seeing she hesitated.

"She is not in his position, and could never be received in society."

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No, dear," Mrs. North said, reflecting that Mr. Wimple's position was not particularly exalted.

"I want him to go out of the country," Aunt Anne went on- -"as far away as possible; I cannot breathe the same air with him, or bear to think that he is beneath the same sky. It is pollution; it is hurrying me out of life; it is most repugnant to me to think that when I am dead he will frequently be within only a few miles of this cottage and of my dear Walter and Florence she stopped for a moment, and shuddered, and put her thin hands, one over the other, under her chin. "When I am dead and buried," she went on, "I believe I should know if his body was put under ground too in the same country with me, and feel the desecration. It has killed me; it has made me eager to die. But I want to know that he will go away — that none of those I care for will ever see his face again; it will be a sacrilege if he even passes them in the street. I want him to have a sum of money, and to go away."

"I have not got it; he took it away with him." Mrs. North looked quite alarmed. "We must make another, this minute," she said; "if the conflagration took place this evening he would get every penny. Let me make it this minute. I can do it on a sheet of note-paper. Don't agitate "I will take care that he has it," Mrs. your dear old self, I shall be back directly "North said gently, "I will speak to the and in a moment she had fled downstairs and returned with her blotting-book, and once more she knelt down by a table to write. "You want to leave everything to the Hibberts, don't you?"

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Hibberts. But, Aunt Anne," she asked, "don't you think you might forgive him? He shall go away, but you would not like to die without forgiving him?" Mrs. North did not for a moment expect her to do it, or even wish it, but she felt it almost a duty to say what she did from a little notion, as old-fashioned as one of Aunt

Anne's perhaps, about dying in charity with all men.

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"No, you must not ask me to do that - and her voice was determined. "I cannot; it was too terrible."

"And I am very glad," Mrs. North said, having eased her conscience with the previous remark "a slightly revengeful spirit comforts one so much."

"Don't let us ever speak of him again, even you and I. I want to shut him out of the little bit of life I have left."

"We never will," Mrs. North said. "Let this be the Amen of him. Now I will make the will. Here is a sheet of note-paper and a singularly bad quill pen." "This is the last Will and Testament of me, Anne Baines (some time called Wimple). I revoke all other wills and codicils, and give and bequeath everything that is mine or may be mine to my dear nephew and niece, Walter and Florence Hibbert." The maid came and stood on one side and Mrs. North on the other, while Aunt Anne gave a little wink to herself, and pushed aside the end of the lavender ribbon lest it should smudge the paper, and signed Anne Baines, looking at every letter as she made it with intense interest. "I am glad to write that name once more," she said, and fell back with a sigh.

From The New Review.

general public. All this has been the case with culture. All the good things it implies in common parlance are understood to be alloyed with pedantry, affectation, æsthetical priggishness. It is believed that the cultured person, like the dilettante of a previous century, will rave about the Corregiosity of Corregio, the symbolic depth of Botticelli, the preciousness of Ruskin's insight into Tintoretto. Or, if he does not take that line, he may be expected to possess a multifarious store of knowledge about all periods of all the arts and literatures, or to be perpetually parading this knowledge in and out of season.

The last sort of stuff is, probably, what my reviewer accused me of hawking over Europe. But this, I am certain, is not what I mean when I talk of culture.

Judged by the etymology of the word, culture is not a natural gift. It implies tillage of the soil, artificial improvement of qualities supplied by nature. It is clearly, then, something acquired, as the lovelinesses of the garden rose are developed from the briar, or the "savage-tasted drupe" becomes "the suave plum" by cultivation. In the full width of its meaning, when applied to human beings, culture is the raising of faculties - physical, mental, emotional, and moral - to their highest excellence by training. In a particular sense, and in order to distinguish culture from education, it implies that this training has been consciously carried on by the individual. Education educes or draws

CULTURE: ITS MEANING AND ITS USES. forth faculties. Culture improves, refines,

BY JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS.

NOT many years ago, I happened to notice the review of one of my books in some weekly periodical. The writer sneered at me for travelling round Europe with a portmanteau full of culture on my back. This made me reflect. What does the reviewer mean by culture? What is it I am supposed to stagger under like a pedlar's pack? And then, what do I mean by culture? How do I value the wares I carry on my shoulders? Reflection convinced me that the reviewer and myself held different opinions about what we both call culture.

and enlarges them, when they have been brought out. Finally, although moral and physical qualities are susceptible of both education and culture, yet it is commonly understood, when we use these terms, that we are thinking of the intellectual faculties. This is specially the case with culture. It would be pedantry to extend its sphere to morals and athletics; we cannot talk of a cultured gymnast or a cultured philanthropist, for instance, when we are referring to a man who has trained either his muscles or his benevolent emotions to their highest excellence.

I will therefore define culture, for the purpose of this discussion, as the raising It is probable that when people use this of previously educated intellectual facul word, nowadays, it signifies for them some ties to their highest potency by the conknowledge of history and literature, intel-scious effort of their possessors. ligence refined by considerable reading, and a susceptibility to the beauties of art and nature. But words which have been overworked, or which have passed into the jargon of cliques, are apt to acquire a secondary and degraded meaning with the

In its most generalized significance, culture may be identified with self-effectuation. The individual attempts to arrive at his real self, to perfect the rudiments supplied by nature in the way for which he is best qualified, and by so doing to

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