Mr. Chillip could do nothing after this, but sit and look at her feebly, as she sat and looked at the fire, until he was called upstairs again. After some quarter of an hour’s absence, he returned.

‘Well?’ said my aunt, taking the cotton out of the ear nearest to him.

‘Well, ma’am,’ returned Mr. Chillip, ‘we are — we are progressing slowly, ma’am.’

‘Ba — a — ah!’ said my aunt, with a perfect shake on the contemptuous interjection. And corked herself as before.

Really — really — as Mr. Chillip told my mother, he was almost shocked; speaking in a professional point of view alone, he was almost shocked. But he sat and looked at