CHAPTER III.

"Promising is the very air o' the time."

It was worse than useless for John to argue, reason, expostulate, cajole, or threaten, when bantered-and when was there a day that he was not?-about the contents of the hamper. The Squire roared with glee at this inexhaustible subject, and insisted upon expressing his belief that John was a closer relative to the boy-for a boy he turned out to be than he was fain to admit. "Yes, yes," he would say, "the saddle's put on the right horse. This accounts for the 'place in town,' and all that smoke is blown away. Oh, John, I little thought that you were a gay deceiver !"

Then John eloquently and emphatically denied the soft impeachment, and asserted that there was no more cause for the accusation than if a dead goose had been consigned to him instead of a fat baby. He gained, however, nothing by this defence; and finding the difficulty unsurpassable of being able to prove the negative, he at length abandoned the attempt, and submitted in a kind of miserable resignation to the squibs that were so plentifully fired at his expense.

"I can't help it," John Hardy sighed, "I can't help it, if you'll not believe a man upon his honour;" and then he placed a hand in a most effective manner upon his waistcoat, and pressed it energetically.

Whether the Squire gave credence to John's negation within himself, is a question that might be answered with safety in the affirmative; but for the mirth which the pretence in disbelieving it excited, he continued to express a total want of faith in the declaration of innocence.

66

Why was the child sent to you if you had

no hand in the matter?" asked he, as they sat

sipping their wine some six months after the

occurrence.

"How should I know, Harry?" replied John, slightly ruffled with the subject under discussion. "It was an accident-a sort of come-bychance, I suppose."

"But why fix upon you in preference to anybody else?"

"Now, there you are baiting me again?" ejaculated John. "I wish you'd drop the affair, I have told you before," continued he, slapping his crossed dexter leg," and I tell ye again, Harry, that I know nothing more of the boy than the man in the moon. I can't tell how he came-"

"Yes you can," interrupted the Squire: "it was in a hamper, you recollect, brought by Mike Crouch."

"Neither can I say who from," resumed John, without noticing the interruption

"Has he recovered from the measles?" asked the Squire, breaking off at a tangent.

"Yes, thank God!" replied John, regaining a look of pleasure. "I was at Dame Woodley's cottage this morning, and I found him as merry as a singing bird."

"Does the old woman still think him an angel wafted from heaven in a basket?"

Yes," returned John, laughing; "his nurse sticks to the creed of such being the mode of his coming to me."

"Well," added the Squire, "it's an original method, certainly."

"I have ordered him to be christened tomorrow," observed John.

"Who are to be the sponsors?" asked the Squire.

"Dame Woodley and Mike," replied John. "It was a particular desire of Mike to become his god-father."

66

Ha, ha, ha," laughed the Squire. "I

fear that Mike is sadly deficient in those

duties which he undertakes to see performed."

Time never slackens his speed: on he goes, without let, check, or stop. The seasons round, night and day he wings his flight, as though he had an end to gain; and yet to Time there is no end. So years flee away, and ages roll, and the to-morrows, from infancy to age, are but the echoes of our yesterdays.

It was a bright and beautiful morning in early spring. Daisies pied and buttercups were thickly scattered over the meadows, and sweeter flowers drew with their fragrant breath the honey bee from its hive, now sadly deficient in the thrifty store leased for the winter gone. That joyous herald of nature's coming charms, the careless butterfly, vain of its fresh-fledged plumes, flitted from bud to blossom, and dipped into many a varied cup, and rifled the depths of the pale cowslip and the daffodil, and kissed the lip of every opening flower in his path. Frugal ants issued from their homes, delved in