The white walls and gleaming columns that had adorned the lovely coasts were no more. Sullen and dull were the shores so lately crested by the cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii. SIR EDWARD BULWER LYTTON. Spell and pronounce : — rumbling, murkiness, combustible, chasm, porticoes, rivaled, mimicries, quaint, preternatural, tortured, heralded, snake-like, impotence, immense, emitting, and impenetrable. Synonyms. — rival — compete; emulate; excel. turbulent-disturbed; agitated; tumultuous; riotous; seditious. suffocating — smothering; stifling; choking. obstruct-bar; barricade; arrest; stop; check; interrupt; clog; choke; impede; retard; oppose; embarrass. ehris'ten, to baptize. LESSON CXVI. doç'ile ly, ready to learn. chǎt'ter, talk idly; carelessly. Silas tǎet, ready power to appreciate and to do what is required by circumstances. SILAS DRESSES THE BABY. Marner's determination to keep the "tramp's child" was matter of hardly less surprise in the village than the robbery of his money. That softening of feeling towards him which dated from his misfortune, that merging of suspicion and dislike in a rather contemptuous pity for him as lone and crazy, was now accompanied with a more women. active sympathy, especially among the Among the notable mothers, Dolly Winthrop was the one whose neighborly officers were the most acceptable to Marner, for they were rendered without any show of bustling instruction. Silas had shown her the half guinea given to him by Godfrey, and had asked her what he should do about getting some clothes for the child. "Eh, Master Marner," said Dolly, "there's no call to buy, no more nor a pair o' shoes; for I've got the little petticoats as Aaron wore five years ago, and it's ill spending money on them baby-clothes, for the child 'ull grow like grass i' May, bless it— that it will." And the same day Dolly brought her bundle, and displayed to Marner, one by one, the tiny garments in their due order of succession, most of them patched and darned, but clean and neat as fresh spring herbs. This was the introduction to a great ceremony with soap and water, from which Baby came out in new beauty and sat on Dolly's knee, handling her toes and chuckling and patting her palms together with an air of having made several discoveries about herself which she communicated by alternate sounds of "gug-gug-gug" and "mammy." "Anybody 'ud. think the angels in heaven couldn't be prettier," said Dolly, rubbing the golden curls and kissing them. "And to think of its being covered with them dirty rags-and the poor mother-frozen to death! But there's one that took care of it, and brought it to your door, Master Marner. The door was open, and it walked in over the snow, like as if it had been a little starved robin. Didn't you say the door was open ?" "Yes," said Silas meditatively, "yes-the door was open. The money's gone, I don't know where, and this is come from I don't know where.” "Ah," said Dolly, with soothing gravity, "it's like the night and the morning, and the sleeping and the waking, and the rain and the harvest — one goes and the other comes, and we know nothing how nor where. You'll happen to be a bit bothered with it while it's so little; but I'll come, and welcome, and see to it for you." “Thank you-kindly," said Silas, hesitating a little. "I'll be glad if you tell me things. But," he added uneasily, leaning forward to look at Baby with some jealousy, as she was resting her head backward against Dolly's arm, and eying him contentedly from a distance-"But I want to do things for it myself, else it may get fond o' somebody else, and not fond o' me. I've been used to fending for myself in the house-I can learn, I can learn." "Eh, to be sure," said Dolly, gently. "I've seen men as are wonderful handy with children. The men are awk'ard and contrary mostly, God help 'em-but when the drink's out of 'em, they aren't unsensible.-You see this goes first, next the skin,” proceeded Dolly, taking up the little shirt and putting it on. "Yes," said Marner, docilely, bringing his eyes very close, that they might be initiated in the mysteries; whereupon Baby seized his head with both her small arms, and put her lips against his face with purring noises. "See there," said Dolly, with a woman's tender tact, "she's fondest o' you. She wants to go on your lap, I'll be bound. Go, then take her, Master Marner; you can put the things on, and then you can say as you've done for her from the first of her coming to you." Marner took her on his lap, trembling with an emotion mysterious to himself, at something unknown dawning on his life. He took the garments from Dolly, and put them on under her teaching; interrupted, of course, by Baby's gymnastics. "There, then! why, you take to it quite easy, Master Marner," said Dolly; "but what shall you do when you're forced to sit in your loom? For she'll get busier every day-she will, bless her. It's lucky as you've got that high hearth instead of a grate, for that keeps the fire more out of her reach: but if you've got anything as can be spilt or broke, or as is fit to cut her fingers off, she'll be at itand it is but right you should know." Silas meditated a little while in some perplexity. "I'll tie her to the leg o' the loom," he said at last-"tie her with a good long strip of something." "Well, mayhap that'll do, as it's a little gell, for they're easier persuaded to sit in one place nor the lads. I know what the lads are; for I've had fourfour I've had, God knows-and if you was to take and tie 'em up, they'd make a fighting and a crying as if you was ringing the pigs. But I'll bring you my little chair, and some bits of red rag and things for her to play with; and she'll sit and chatter to them as if they were alive. Eh, if it wasn't a sin to the lads to wish 'em made different, bless 'em, I should ha' been glad for one of 'em to be a little gell. I could ha' taught her to scour, and mend, and the knitting, and everything. But I can teach 'em this little one, Master Marner, when she gets old enough." "But she'll be my little un," said Marner, rather hastily. "She'll be nobody else's." "No, to be sure; you'll have a right to her, if you're a father to her, and bring her up according. But," added Dolly, coming to a point which she had determined beforehand to touch upon, "you must bring her up like christened folks' children, and take her to church, and let her learn her catechism. That's what you must do, Master Marner, if you'd do the right thing by the orphan child." "What is it you mean by 'christened'?" he said at last, timidly. "Won't folks be good to her without it?" "Dear! dear! Master Marner," said Dolly, with gentle distress and compassion. "Had you never no father nor mother as taught you to say your prayers, and as there's good words and good things to keep us from harm?" "Yes," said Silas in a low voice; "I know a deal about that- used to, used to. But I want to do everything as can be done for the child. But whatever's right for her in this country, and you think 'ull do her good, I'll act according, if you'll tell me." “Well, then, Master Marner," said Dolly, inwardly rejoiced, “I'll ask Mr. Macey to speak to the parson about it; and you must fix on a name for it, for it must have a name give it when it's christened." "My mother's name was Hephzibah," said Silas, "and my little sister was named after her." "Eh, that's a hard name," said Dolly. "I partly think it isn't a christened name." "It's a Bible name," said Silas,-old ideas recurring. "Then I've no call to speak against it," said Dolly, rather startled by Silas's knowledge on this head; "but you see, I'm no scholar, and I'm slow at catching the words. But, it was awk'ard calling |