IN LODGINGS AT KNIGHTSBRIDGE.

IN THREE PARTS.

PART I.

years have elapsed since then, and the trousseau, through the exertions of the laundress MRS. DEVLIN was an Irishwoman, and a and the flux of time, has disappeared; but I widow. In the first of these capacities she am still a steady customer of the tidy shop was attractive; in the second, she was re- at Knightsbridge, where Mrs. Devlin presigned. I cannot say of my own certain sides in her own right, and over a forewoknowledge that she regarded the decease man whom I remember a blooming, idle, of Devlin as "no loss; " but there was a busy clever girl, and carries on a business much sprightliness about the little woman, a increased and expedited by the lately-incheerful self-reliant content in her face, in vented sewing-machine. It is a long way her manner, in her movements, and a tone from Bedford Row to Knightsbridge, and I of satisfaction with the arrangements of do not very often see Mrs. Devlin; but the world in general, and those which affect- whenever I go to her shop, we make a ed her own lot in particular, which led me regular gossipping occasion of it, and all to form such a conclusion. I had known Mrs. Devlin prior to her widowhood; but I had never seen the late Mark, who had been an out-pensioner of his wife's from the time at which she became forewoman of Mrs. Jackson's ready-made-linen and stay warehouse at Knightsbridge, and had died before she had succeeded to the business. Mrs. Jackson was Honor Devlin's aunt; and I have occasionally thought that had her niece been still in the enjoyment of conjugal bliss, Mrs. Jackson (who was a spinster, and Mrs. by brevet only) would not have made her unconditionally her sole heir. As it was, the old lady had done a very wise thing, and Honor Devlin carried on the business with probity, activity, and success. I and mine had been customers of Mrs. Jackson's for many years; and when I united my. destinies with my dear James Pennifold, and thereby incurred the lasting reprobation of my aunt, Lady Moore, and my uncle, General Croxholm - for James was only a junior partner in a solicitor's firm of no great distinction, and our house was situated in that unfashionable and uninteresting locality, Bedford Row-I had also recourse to Mrs. Devlin for the articles in her line for my modest trousseau. Some

other customers are handed over to the subordinates. It fell out one day, while the International Exhibition was open, that my nurse came to me with the melancholy intelligence that Master James was destitute of pinafores "which there ain't no keeping of him in sich, ma'am, I do assure you," said nurse hurriedly, lest I should confound her with remonstrances and dates of purchase; "what with a hinking of 'em when his par will let him into his study, and never takes no notice of him, which he comes out a hawful sight most mornings, and what with a-tearing of 'em with his saw and cutting of 'em with his chisel—and them there tool-chests is the mischeevousest toys as ever was brought into a nus'ry - the poor child ain't fit to be seen."

I happened to want some little patterns just then, and I told nurse that I would call at Mrs. Devlin's and select them, and also the newest form of pinafores for James, on my return from the Exhibition. As I was speaking, a letter was handed to me. It was from James's aunt, Mrs. Carter; a very nice but peculiar old lady, who lived in Somersetshire, and maintained a discreet distance between herself and her relations. Not that she was unkind; on the contrary,

her accurate recollection of birthdays was something wonderful, and her congratulations invariably took the shape of large hampers, liberally filled, carefully packed, and punctually carriage paid. She never came on a visit to us, and when we had our autumn holiday she never invited us to spend it with her; but said very candidly she was an oddity, and could neither sacrifice her own odd ways nor ask any one else to put up with them.

out him, and there must be no children or cats in the house,'

person to assist me. My difficulty explained to her, she assumed the look of consideration from which good counsel resulted.

"Two sitting-rooms, ma'am, and a large bedroom -a glimpse of the Park, no children, no cats?" I nodded assent. "Well, ma'am, I dont know all in a minute like. I suppose it would not do for the lady to be over a shop?

"Well, no; I think not," I said, "unless I cannot do better. But what lodgings do you know of over a shop? I might see them, at all events."

It was six o'clock on a brilliant June day when I found myself seated in Mrs. Devlin's shop, and looking over a variety of small and, to the uninitiated, mysterious articles, all my needs in which the brisk little woman understood as well as I did. I had made my selection, and was exchanging some friendly words with her previous to leaving, when my eye fell on the address of "I am coming up to see the Exhibition," a parcel on the counter, "Mrs. Cringle, wrote the old lady; "though the building is Elm House, Taunton, Somersets." It rehideous, and the interior arrangement, judg- called Mrs. Carter's letter, and the task of ing by the pictures of it, detestable. The lodging-hunting: Mrs. Devlin was the very telescope-and-the-pickle trophy ought to keep me away, and would do so but that I am too old to go to Rome to see the Cleopatra and the Sibyl, and you have got them there, and I want to see them and the tinted Venus before I die. There is a picture or two also I want to look at; and one can keep out of the middle of the big Barn if one likes, I suppose, as I certainly shall like. Now, my dear Margaret, you and James will at once think of inviting me to your house; I beg you will not lose time, and retard the real service you will do me, by making an invitation I will not accept. I shall see you and James very often, I hope, while I remain in town; but I will not stay as a guest in your house or in that of any other person. What you can do for me is this: to look for lodgings for me within an easy and reasonable distance of the Exhibition Barn, and where, if possible, I may get sight of the Park or Kensington Gardens. I want quiet tidy rooms for myself and old Joan, who has forgotten her grumbling and her rheumatism in the prospect of seeing London. I fancy she and I are brisker and more energetic than you are; for I find it is the mode nowadays for young people to affect the lassitude and indifference which in my time old people would have been ashamed of. But I don't want to reform the world, only to enjoy a glimpse of it; so take the lodgings from Monday next. Tell the people to expect me at 6 PM., and to have something for dinner; don't be there to meet me, but come at 12 on Tuesday. Take the lodgings as soon as possible, and send me the address at once. Yours affectionately, ANNE CARTER.

"P.S. I shall bring Corporal Trim; if I left him here, he would have too much meat and no exercise. I will pay extra for him if required; but I will not go with

She turned her frank gray Irish eyes upon me, saying with a smile, "Why, then, I was just thinking of my own, ma'am. The lady that's in them is going away on Thursday. She gave me leave to put a bill up; but I would not, for she is delicate and in trouble, and would have been disturbed by people; and there is no fear but that they will be let quick enough when she is gone."

It occurred to me very strongly as Mrs. Devlin was speaking, that the very best arrangement I could make for Mrs. Carter's comfort would be to take these rooms. I had not seen them; but I felt assured they must be clean, comfortable, and well-ordered, merely because they belonged to Mrs. Devlin. The back-windows looked to the Park, and the front to Wilton Place; so there was plenty of air. The brisk little Irishwoman had no children, and I did not suspect her of a partiality to cats. The shop certainly did constitute an objection, but one not sufficiently strong to counterbalance the advantages the arrangement offered. I could easily make the old lady understand the season was an exceptional one; and that all things considered, she could not do better. I proposed to Mrs. Delvin that she should show me the rooms; and passing through a side-door opening from the shop, I found myself at the foot of

"Knightsbridge, 9 P.M. "MY DEAR Margaret, The lodgings are nice, but noisy. The noise cannot be helped; it makes Corporal Trim bark at present he thinks it announces burglars but he will get used to it by and by, and so shall I, no doubt. Joan was tired and cross; but she could not resist your nice little Irishwoman, who had every thing so comfortable for us, even to some roses in the vases on the chimney-piece, lest we might miss the country,' she said. The dinner was capital. I believe she has an eye' to the cooking; though how she can attend to the shop and her lodgers also, I am unable to understand. She has a happy knack of selecting servants too. I did not think London could boast anything so clean, tidy, and modest, as the damsel who waits on us. Somersetshire too! Joan is quite at home with her. Be punctual tomorrow. I don't mean to go to the Barn till Wednesday, and you shall come with me.

Old

that I had done, and duly notified her arri- | If it were her father's old place, where she val at Mrs. Devlin's by the following char- had lived as a girl, I could understand it; acteristic note, written on the Monday though even that would be very sentimennight a few hours after her arrival: tal for Aunt Anne, whom I always considered a most unsentimental person. Carter was not likely to cultivate any thing of that kind in her disposition, I should think." Be that as it might, and whatever her motive, Mrs. Carter purchased Woodlee, put all the buildings into thorough repair, let the land, with the exception of the pretty pleasure-ground surrounding the house, and established herself there in a style of unpretending but very substantial dowager comfort, which did not imply the expenditure of her income, as we supposed it to be, or any thing like it. To be sure, we may have been mistaken in our calculation; people are apt to be so liberal in their estimate of the wealth of others, especially when it is right and reasonable that some of it should come their way. In one respect Mrs. Carter formed an exception to well-dowered widows. No one ever speculated upon the probabilities for or against her contracting a second marriage. This was unaccountable; but it was the case. She was only forty years old when Mr. Carter had followed his harmless ancestors to their irreproachably respectable family-vault. She was rich, handsome, and popular. She was not accredited by the voice of society with a broken heart or buried affections; she never talked sentiment, or indeed cant of any kind; she never bored any body about the beloved departed; and she left off her weeds, like a sensible woman, at the end of the period prescribed for practical persons who do not desire to be nuisances to their neighbours. She had been a good sensible wife, and she continued to be a good sensible widow; and I am quite sure it never occurred to any one, not even to a half-pay officer, or an elderly curate, that he might induce her to change her condition. She was a just and generous woman, and her brother's children had all benefited in their various needs by her modest wealth. Of them, James was her favourite, and she had added much personal kindness and warmth of friendship to the pecuniary aid she had given him.

Yours ever,

A. C."

James's aunt was a handsome well-preserved old lady, of upwards of fifty. She was very clever, and had been all her life a great reader. I knew little of her story but its outlines, in which there was nothing remarkable. She was the only sister of my husband's father, and had married when she had passed her first youth a country-gentleman much older than herself, who died in the fifth year of their marriage, leaving her all his unentailed property, of which a considerable portion consisted of land. She had no children, few relatives, and none but distant connections on her husband's side, with whom I understand she kept up little or no intercourse. She was a very agreeable woman, -good, charitable, and popular; but I always fancied she had a strong spice of obstinacy in her character, though I had no personal knowledge of the fact. I was led to think so in consequence of having learned from James that his aunt had persisted against his opinion, and that of her late husband's advisers, in selling the land which he had bequeathed to her, and purchasing a small estate near Taunton, which she had bought at far too high a price, as they believed. "And why she wanted to go and live there," James had said when he told me the circumstance, "I cannot make out.

Mrs. Carter behaved very handsomely on the occasion of our marriage, though she refused to come to our wedding, "in the first place," as she said in a letter to James, "because I never go to any one's wedding, and in the second, because I have no fancy for beholding the grand airs of my Lady Moore, and the blinking, purblind fatuity of General Croxholm applied to