said my mother. ‘We thought — Mr. Copperfield thought — it was quite a large rookery; but the nests were very old ones, and the birds have deserted them a long while.’

‘David Copperfield all over!’ cried Miss Betsey. ‘David Copperfield from head to foot! Calls a house a rookery when there’s not a rook near it, and takes the birds on trust, because he sees the nests!’

‘Mr. Copperfield,’ returned my mother, ‘is dead, and if you dare to speak unkindly of him to me — ’

My poor dear mother, I suppose, had some momentary intention of committing an assault and battery upon my aunt, who could easily have settled her with one hand, even if my mother had been in far better training