can never do." Saying which she turned to the trembling Annie, desiring her to be ready against she called.

Lady McJames dared not remonstrate further, as she looked up to Lady Eustace, who was noble, accomplished, fashionable, and rich. She had no children; and as her lord was nearly related to Sir James McJames, his wife hoped great things for herself and children

from the connexion.

Lady Eustace, whom time proved to me the most warm-hearted and benevolent of created beings, endured the company of Lady McJames, whom she could neither like nor esteem, to please her husband, who was so nearly related. to Sir James. She had, for the same reason, stood godmother to Annie; and when she found what a poor, sickly, deformed little creature she became, and how evidently she was disliked and neglected by her hard and unnatural mother, Lady Eustace determined to show her more pointed kindness than ever.

When this generous lady was gone, Lady

McJames came back to the school-room in a very ill-humour at her friend's "strange taste," as she called it, desiring me, with more than her usual roughness, to "get the girl ready."

I very cheerfully obeyed, while Annie was so overjoyed that she could scarcely contain herself.

"Dear Miss Dornay," she exclaimed, "if you were but going with me, I should be perfectly happy."

"I am happy to see you so, my dear," I replied, and as the affectionate child kissed me, tears of gratitude and joy streamed down her pale face.

Her clothes were always inferior to her sister's, and I was really ashamed that Lady Eustace should see how shabbily she was clad, though, of course, I made no observations on the subject to my pupil.

I was so pleased at seeing the happy girl set off with her kind godmother, that I endured cheerfully all the ill-humour and ill-behaviour of the mother and children the rest of the day.

In the evening Annie returned with a new beaver bonnet, fur cape and muff, the gift of her compassionate friend.

This so disconcerted Lady McJames, who thought that her eldest darling ought to have had them, that her husband not being present, she gave way to a passionate burst of indignation against the "disgusting partiality,” as she called it, of her friend.

At length bed-time came, and Annie and I escaped from the storm; she related to me how much she had enjoyed herself, and that her godmother had desired her to thank me for my great kindness and attention to one who had been so long and so cruelly neglected.

"I told her," added the child, "how unhappy I was that you were so uncomfortable, and that I was afraid you would go away if you could."

"Indeed, my dear Annie," I replied, "if it were not for you I should be miserable; and if I had any where to go to I should certainly leave Scotland when the year for which I am engaged to your mamma is expired."

"What will become of me if you go?" sobbed Annie.

I need not enumerate all my little trials and troubles, and the petty tyranny to which I was daily exposed. Continually scolded for the backwardness and obstinacy of some of my pupils, and equally rated for the forwardness and docility displayed by Annie—I at length took courage, and informed Lady McJames. that as I could not succeed in giving her satisfaction, I should wish to leave her in June, when my year would be completed.

"Leave me!" screamed the lady, "indeed you will do no such thing. You have no friends to go to, and I consider you as bound to me for as long a time as I may please to keep you. A pretty thing, indeed, after the expense of bringing you all this distance to be left in the lurch by you."

"But, Madam," (1 ventured to say,) "you accuse me of not doing justice to the young ladies, and therefore

"Be silent, miss, and leave the room. I brought you to Scotland, and in Scotland

you shall remain till I choose to send you from it."

I was quite petrified by this decision. It is true I did not know where to turn, nor whither to go. I had a sort of indistinct idea that if I could once get to London, my good friend Mrs. Davies would endeavour to procure me a situation as nursery governess in some less odious family than the one I was now in; but I was so ignorant of the ways of the world, and so frightened by the manners and tone of Lady McJames, that I really almost believed that she had a right to detain me. The fact was, she knew that she could get no one else, who would be such an obedient drudge for such a salary, and therefore she determined not to let me slip through her fingers. But of this I was not then aware.

In the mean time I occasionally saw Lady Eustace, who was so kind once or twice as to ask me with the children to her hotel, when she took occasion to inquire with great delicacy into my little history, and soon gleaned

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