and occasionally in parts where age was no draw-back and ugliness desirable—such as a witch, or duenna, or whatever in the dialogue was poetically called "Hag." Indeed, Hag was the name she usually took from Rugge—that which she bore from her defunct husband was Gormerick. This lady, as she braided the garland, was also bent on the soothing system, saying, with great sweetness, considering that her mouth was full of pins, "Now, deary—now, dovey—look at r in the glass; we could beat 00, and pinch 00, and stick pins into 00, dovey, but we won't. Dovey will be good, I know;" and a great pat of rouge came on the child's pale cheeks. The clown therewith squatting before her with his hands on his knees, grinned lustily, and shrieked out, "My eyes, what a beauty!"
Rugge, meanwhile, one hand thrust in his bosom, contemplated the diplomatic efforts of his ministers, and saw by Sophy's compressed lips and unwinking eyes, that their cajoleries were unsuccessful. He approached, and hissed into her ear, "Don't madden me! don't—you will act, eh?"
"No," said Sophy, suddenly rising; and tearing the wreath from her hair, she set her small foot on it witlj force. "No! not if you killed me!"
"Gods!" faltered Rugge. "And the sum I have paid! I am diddled! Who has gone for Mrs. Crane?"
"Tom," said the clown.
The word was scarcely out of the clown's mouth ere Mrs. Crane herself emerged from a side-scene, and, putting off her bonnet, laid both hands on the child's shoulders, and looked her in the face without speaking. The child as firmly returned the gaze. Give that child a martyr's cause, and in that frail body there would have been a martyr's soul. Arabella Crane, not inexpe- rienced in children, recognized a power of will, stronger than the power of brute force, in that tranquillity of eye—the spark of calm light in its tender blue—blue, pure as the sky; light, steadfast as the star.
"Leave her to me, all of you," said Mrs. Crane. "I will take her to your private room, Mr. Rugge;" and she led the child away to a sort of recess, room it could not be rightly called, fenced round with boxes and crates, and containing the manager's desk and two stools.
' Sophy," then said Mrs. Crane, "you say you will not act unless your grandfather be with you. Now, hear me. You know that I have been always stern and hard with you. I never professed to love you—nor do I. But you have not found me untruthful. When I say a thing seriously, as I am speaking
