and adorned with bottles, and regular rows of white pots marked with every variety of jam and jelly. These were however all left to the imagination, for drawer and door were kept carefully locked; and Mrs. Whyte's keys safely lodged in that vast receptacle—her pocket.
The party were assembled by five o'clock—the nurse and house-keeper duly occupying two old-fashioned arm-chairs on each side the fire, while the two children were placed on stools at their feet. The two aged servants were singular contrasts. Mrs. Whyte was the very model of a neat, pretty old woman. Her pale brown hair, a little tinged with gray, parted as it had parted all her life, in two equal divisions on her forehead; the high muslin cap was like a pyramid of snow. Mrs. Whyte would not have worn a coloured ribbon for the world. A muslin handkerchief was neatly pinned down in front, and a brown silk gown completed her attire. We had nearly forgotten a white apron, also a ribbon, from which hung a pin-cushion, whose gaiety quite enlivened
