the house at onct, bekase she said the misthress might take to it kindly having lost her own. Besides the poor woman has more nor she can do for her six children, and her husband worse than dead to her on account of the dhrink." "It's a real beauty," exclaimed Max kiss ing the rosy mouth. "Look, Aunt, it opens its eyes and they look like violets peeping from under the white lids. "This is no base-born child," said Mrs. Dormer, "although the clothes are plain enough. Here is a singular mark behind one ear." "Arrah, what kind of a mark, ma'am? Shure it might be the manes of finding out her people some day!" "It looks like a little heart," said Max after a grave examination, "don't you think so, Aunt?" "It is a strawberry, not a heart, dear. I should like to keep this child," Mrs. Dormer continued, "for its own sake as well as mine." will not call baby after any of them, shall we, Aunty ?" "I shall call her Josephine after my lost darling," said Mrs. Dormer, quietly putting an end to the altercation. The clock now struck five. "Mr. Dormer will be home immediately, Winny, and you know he does not like to wait for dinner." "Thrue for you, ma'am. Bedad I was forgetting it, and the fish boiling on the fire," and Winny made a rush to the kitchen. The baby now became fretful but Mrs. Dormer lulled it to sleep. She then passed into an adjoining room saying she would put the foundling in baby's cot and show it to Mr. Dormer after dinner. When she returned to the sitting room she found Max had wheeled his uncle's arm chair to the fire and placed his slippers before it. "You are very careful of your uncle's comfort to-night, Max," she said with a faint smile. "Yes, I want to put him in good humour," and his bright eyes gleamed archly in answer "To be shure you would, ma'am. Its just to her meaning smile. Its just to her meaning smile. "I hope Winny has the thing to divart your mind." got something good for dinner, something that he likes, so that he wont be cross." "And what name shall we call it, aunt ?" asked Max, delighted at the thought of keeping the baby. "Shall it be Mabel, or Ethel or Violet ?" "Och, what quare names, Masther Max! Wouldn't it be betther to call it after some saint, ma'am ?" "Maybe it's Bridget you would wish to call it ?" said the boy laughing. "Max" said Mrs. Dormer reprovingly, and the boy was silenced, but he knew his opinion of his uncle's character was correct, and that good fare sweetened his usual moroseness, brightening for a time the gloom that generally hung over the little household. A ring at the door now announced the master's arrival and Max flew down stairs for "Faix, then, you might give it a worse he always stormed if kept a minute waiting. name." "Oh, bother, Winny, we wont call it Bridget for all the holy Biddys in the world. We might as well call it Winny after you." "What if you did, then! wasn't there a saint of my name?" she retorted indignantly. "I never heard of a saint Winny," Max said with a provoking grin. "Maybe you heard of Saint Winifred, then. That's the rale name, not Winny at all." "What horrid names the saints had! We "Dinner not on the table yet," was his fretful remark on entering the room. No fond kiss given to the delicate wife so lately bereaved, no kind inquiry after her health. "Shure the dinner is ready and a good one it is, masther," said Winny now entering and placing the dishes on the table. "This is the finest turbot the Claddagh boys caught this year and a rale bargain, sir." There was a gleam of satisfaction in the cold blue eye and the shadow of a smile Dinner was over and he was enjoying a cigar when a wail from the next room made him ask eagerly what noise that was which sounded like a baby's cry. round the mouth as the master placed him- gleaming with rainbow tints and reflecting self at the table. the tall cliffs lining the wild coast. Along the rugged by-way leading from Carraghmore towards the Friary of St. Bride, a tall pedestrian toiled wearily. She was wrapped, notwithstanding the summer heat, in the blue cloak worn by the peasant women in the west of Ireland. The ten years that have "What does the boy mean?" and Mr. passed over Dinah Blake's head, have graven Dormer turned to his wife in surprise. her brow with many furrows, and dimmed In a few words she explained what had the lustre of her flashing eye. As she neared occurred. the ruins her step was slower and her head "And you wish to keep this foundling?" bowed down by the crushing weight of bitter he said coldly. "And so it is, another baby which Aunt Amy got," broke in Max impetuously. "Yes, I should like it very much if you have no objection," was the submissive reply. "Look, uncle! what a little beauty it is," said Max who had brought the infant from the cot and held it to be admired by Mr. Dormer. "All babies look alike," he said curtly. "I really cannot see why you should wish to trouble yourself with this child, Amy. A man would never think of hampering himself with such a burden." "It would be a great comfort to me," pleaded Mrs. Dormer. "You will let me adopt it; you can't refuse." "Well, if you are so very anxious you may do so, but keep it out of my way, don't let its squalling annoy me;" and Mr. Dormer resumed his cigar, while his wife-a glad smile brightening her face-retired into the next room with her young charge-Max following to express his congratulations. At memories. She soon reached the secluded ́ A nurse from Carraghmore had been hired to attend the Major. This woman was an old friend of Dinah's, and she now went ostensibly with the kind intention of offering to relieve her, for some hours, of her duties as nurse, in order that she might take some rest and sleep; but Dinah's real motive was to gain admittance to the sick man's "Sit down in that aisy chair near the bed," she whispered, fearful of awakening the patient, "and make yourself comfortable. You won't have much throuble, for he sleeps nearly all the time; only watch him, and when he wakes up give him a spoonful of this bottle on the little table beside you; and now I'm off to my bed; and it's a good sleep I'll be able to take, thanks to you, Dinah jewel!" Hour after hour Dinah Blake watched beside the dying man, grim and silent as death itself, gloating over the wreck disease had made in that handsome countenance. Utterly helpless, he, the fascinating man of the world, lay there, beneath the feet of the Pale Horse and his Rider. He was going fast; and there was no heavenly light, no star of hope to brighten the way through the Dark Valley. "He'll never deludher any more poor girls to their ruin," said Dinah, mentally. "It's many a mother's curse he's bearing with him to the judgment." Suddenly Major Barrington awoke, and Dinah knew by the awful change in his face that the end was near; and now was the time to impart the news she had come that night to communicate. The Major, too, seemed conscious of his approaching end, and his eyes turned with piteous appeal to his nurse, as if she could help him in this mortal struggle. But a face stony as marble met that look unmoved. "Is it pity you're wanting ?" she hissed through her closed teeth, her eyes glowing with hate. "What pity did you show Nora Blake and others like her in the time of their sore disthress and shame. Yes, it's going fast you are, and the devil will soon get his own. It's well you sarved him in this world!" and Dinah's fiendish laugh broke painfully the stillness of the death chamber. The dying man gazed in horror and amazement at his strange nurse. He was too weak to speak ; he could only look his astonishment as his ear drank in the startling revelation she went on to make. "You remember Nora Blake, the purty young girl you promised to marry, although another misfortunate woman owned you at the same time. Lying rascal that you are!” and Dinah's eyes glared on the wretched man. "Well," she resumed, "Nora's mother vowed to be revenged, and she kept her word. The child owned as the heiress of Barrington Height is not the one left by your wife, as you and the world thinks. It's Nora's own child. A gleam of rage shot from the Major's eyes, and the startling intelligence, so unexpected, gave him a momentary strength. "Where is the other child?" he gasped faintly. "Oh she's with them that wont bring her up as dainty as if she was the heiress of Barrington Height," replied Dinah with a mocking smile. Major Barrington groaned and looked around for some familiar face, some one to aid him in this sore perplexity. If Dr. Holmes would come to receive this hateful. woman's confession, the lost daughter of his wife might still be restored to her rightful inheritance. But no friend was near, no face but that fiendish woman's gloating over his misery. This was the hour of Dinah's triumph; thus was the betrayed Nora avenged. The shock he had received hastened his death. His tormentor seeing that he had not many minutes to live hastily summoned the nurse. She did not now fear the pres ence of a third person. weak to reveal what he had heard. The Major was too mind," remarked the nurse eagerly. "I'll give him a dhrop of this cordial and maybe he'll be able to tell." "I'm afeard he's dying," Dinah observed with assumed concern. "He slept quiet till a short time since. I didn't think death was so near." The observation startled Dinah. "It's no use thrying to keep him alive," she urged. "That stuff would choke him at onct; he's too far gone now; there, it's all over," she added, and a gleam of satisfaction shot from her gray eye when she perceived the gasping breath cease and the light of life die out of the ghastly face. "He's gone to his account and Nora's wrongs is avenged," was Dinah Blake's mental observation as she passed exultant from the death chamber of Major Barrington. To be continued. Did I know the sun was hot, And the wind's rude breath was strong? Oh, must there be ever a "crook i' the lot," And ever a break in the song? Was it fate? Was it chance? Who knows? And the red on the lip no fading shows; Rose: But the heart is touched with blight, ST. JOHN, N. B. OUR COMMERCIAL RELATIONS WITH THE UNITED STATES. A BY J. MCL. T the recent meeting of the National | ties concerned, the present may be assumed Board of Trade of the United States a proper time to consider it in any and every held at St. Louis, the question of "freedom light that may help to reach a solution. The of Trade with the Dominion of Canada" framers of the Treaty of Washington have was prominent among the subjects for dis- lately set a good example of conceding much cussion, and a delegation from the Dominion to the preservation of national amity, a prinBoard of Trade was invited to a conference. ciple that we shall find to be here of paraThe treatment of the subject was reported mount force; let us consider the question as in the St. Louis newspapers, and received it affects the welfare and the harmony of the some currency in the leading Canadian two nations, and rise, if possible, above the journals, and the resolution of the National local and temporary interests that have so Board "to memorialize Congress to provide often, as we believe, given tone to its popuby law for the appointment of a commis- lar discussions. sion to meet commissioners from the Dominion of Canada (should the Dominion Government appoint a like commission) to negotiate a basis of a treaty between Great Britain and the United States for commercial relations with the Dominion of Canada" must be to parties on both sides so far satisfactory. The invitation extended to the National Board to meet the Dominion Board of Tarde at Ottawa in January, led to some further popular discussion, and as the matter has been already more than once the subject of diplomatic negotiation, and is confessed on all hands to be of great importance to the well-being and the well-doing of the par The National Board of Trade added to its resolution a series of four propositions as the basis of a treaty; let us consider for a moment how these appear from our side, before laying them aside to look at the gravity of the general question; the propositions are: Ist. The introduction of all manufactures and products of the United States into the Dominion of Canada free of import duty, and the like concession by the United States to the manufactures and products of the Dominion." This proposition seemed startling to some of our Canadian delegates who held that the "infant" manufactures of |