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are at present so well satisfied. It affords at any rate a basis upon which development to any extent may easily be introduced under the supervision of any foreigners whom the Chinese government may enlist into their service with a view to improvement; for without adventitious aid and example it is useless for China to attempt any measure in the way of progress, however she may dispense with such support afterwards. Let her take example in this respect from Japan, a country furnished very much like herself in respect to postal arrangements when lately opened to foreign relations, and yet which-after only six years' adoption of the foreign system of postal agency-is able to publish a report by its Postmaster-General showing the following wonderful and creditable statistics of correspondence, which we copy from the Pall Mall Gazette : During the fiscal year ended the 30th day of the sixth month of the tenth year of Meiji (June 30, 1877) there went through the post-office 22,053,430 ordinary letters, 606,354 registered letters, 6,764,272 postal cards, 7,372,536 (Japanese) newspapers-an increase of 2,323,141 from the year before-322,642 books, patterns, &c., and 856,637 free communications. Of the letters 105,188 contained money. The department of undelivered correspondence had to puzzle over 43,942 incorrectly or illegibly directed letters, of which 6,124 were given up as a bad job and sent to the Dead Letter Office. During the year 489 letters and packages were lost by theft or highway robbery, of which 424 were subsequently recovered and delivered intact, and 102 letters were destroyed by fire or shipwreck. The family of a carrier who lost his life in defending his mail-bag against robbers has been pensioned, and rewards have been given to eleven persons for aiding to save the mails in cases of robbery, inundation, and shipwreck. Seven new money-order offices were established during the year, and 72 new post-office savings-banks, making the total number of the former 317, and of the latter 161."

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any doing of theirs-but this, perhaps, is true only in respect to Lottie, who took no steps consciously to produce the rapprochement which had taken place so strangely between the heaven of the Deanery and the earth of the Lodges. She had not done anything to recommend herself to Lady Caroline or Lady Caroline's nephew. And yet with both she had become an important "factor," to use a fashionable term, in the immediate concerns of life. The Captain was not so innocent of purpose in the commotion he had begun to make. But still he had not calculated upon the interest that would be excited by his proceedings. The community at St. Michael's was quiet and had little to rouse its interest. Sometimes a Canon would be translated to a higher and a better stall-sometimes an old Chevalier would die

and be replaced by another veteran not much less old than he-sometimes a son would "go wrong" and create a great deal of whispered communication and shaking of heads. At the present time there were no daughters to marry except Lottie, so that the pleasanter strain of possibility was little thought of. All this made it very inspiring, very agitating to the dwellers round the Abbey, when a family within the precincts gave them so much to think about. A girl likely to make a very good match in a romantic way: a man likely to make a very bad one, in a way which might have been quite as romantic had it not been on the wrong side, such as would debase, not exalt his class; these two probabilities coming together had a great effect upon the popular mind. In the Chevaliers' Lodges there was very little else talked about. Captain Temple, the most respected of all the Chevaliers, could not keep still, so excited was he. He had spoken to "the father," he told his wife, to put him on his guard, and to show him how necessary it was to take proper care of his child. That was all he could do: but he could not content himself with thus doing what he could. He paced about his little sitting-room, disturbing Mrs. Temple at her wool-work. She was not like her husband. She was a still, composed, almost stern woman, with a passionate heart, to which she gave very little expression. She could not talk of her daughter as Captain Temple could. The remembrance of the years during which her child was separated from her was terrible to her. When her husband talked as he was accustomed to do of this great grief of theirs, she never stopped him, but she herself was dumb. She closed all her windows, as it were, and retired into a fortress of silent anguish, out of which no cry came; but she listened to him all the same. This was what she did now, though it pained her to hear of this other girl who stood between life and death, between good and evil, as once her child had stood. She would have helped Lottie with all her heart, but she could not bear to hear her talked of-though this was precisely what she had to bear.

"I told him it was his duty to look after his daughter," said Captain Temple, pacing-three steps one way, four the other-about the room. "But he won't-you will see he won't. A beautiful girl, far too good for him, a girl who deserves a better fate. She puts me in mind of

our own dear girl, Lucy. I have told you so before."

To this Mrs. Temple made no reply. He had told her so a great many times before. She selected a new shade of her Berlin wool, and set her elbow rigidly against the arm of her chair, that she might thread her needle without trembling, but she made no reply.

"She puts me constantly in mind of her. The way she holds her head, and her walk, and I beg your pardon, my dear. I know you don't like this kind of talk; but if you knew how I seem to see her wherever I go wherever I go ! I wonder if she is permitted to come and walk by her old father's side, God bless her. Ah! well, it was Despard's daughter we were talking of. To think he should have this

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