Catharine Furze

igious book. On hot summer afternoons Mr. Furze always took off his coat before he had his nap, and sometimes divested himself of his waistcoat. When the coat and waistcoat were taken of

ir with a high back was always carried by Mr. Furze upstairs after dinner, together with a common kitchen chair, and on these he slumbered. The room was never used, save on Sundays and when Mrs. Furze gave a tea-party. It overlooked the market-place, and, although on a Sunday afternoon the High Street was almost completely silent, Mrs. Furze liked to sit so near the window that she could peep out at the edge of the blind when she was not dozing. It is true no master nor mistress ever stirred at that hour, but every now and then a maidservant could be seen, and she was better than nothing for the purpose of criticism. A round table stood in the middle of the room with a pink vase on it containing artificial flowers, and on the mantelpi

ternoon following the day of which the his

en thinking a good deal of Catharine

d Mr. Furze,

st, - I do not know what to call it - profane, I may say, which she applied to her dog when talking of it to Mr. Gosford. Th

s - what is

have a

ut a year or two before that date some houses had been built at the north end of the town and called "The Terrace." A new doctor had taken one, the brewer another, an

ear, what i

he Terrace Mrs. Colston would call on us. As the wife of a brewer, she cannot do so now. Then there is just another thing which has been on my mind for a long time. It is settled that Mr. Jennings is to leave, for he has accepted an invitation from the cause at Ely. I do not think we shall like anybody after Mr. Jennings, and it would be a good opportunity for us

d, "It is a very serious matter. I m

ing and evening, but he did not pray extempore, as did the elect, and contented himself with reading prayers from a book called "Family Devotions." The days were over for Eastthorpe when a man like Mr. Furze could be denounced, a man who paid his pew-rent regularly, and contributed to the missionary societies. The days were over when any expostulations could be addressed to him, or any attempts made to bring him within the fold, and Mr. Jennings therefore called on him, and religion was not mentioned. It may seem extraordinary that, without convictions based on any reasoning process, Mr. Furze's outward existence should have been so correct and so moral. He had passed through the usually stormy period of youth without censure. It is true he was married young, but before his marriage nobody had ever heard a syllable against him, and, after marriage, he never drank a drop too much, and never was guilty of a

ly fair to her to say that she did really wish to go for Catharine's sake. She l

t have you to say t

my dinner

the Terrace. H

inutes

all weathers; and the

in the long run, because you would not be expe

at the business

ntion will be more fixed upon it than it c

educated to know that something, and a great deal, too, can be said for anything, and

f we leave off chapel and go to church

u know you have as many customer

who go to chape

on't leave us because we are Dissenters, and, as there are five times

took place, did not bring more people to the shop, and some left who were in the habit of c

he rooms here; what s

it is business up to the garret. I should turn the parlour into a counting-house. It isn't the proper thing for you to be standing always at that pokey little desk at the end of the counter with a pen behind your ear. Turn the parlo

r, Nurse Judkins came and said he must be a good boy and go away, and how he heard a little cry, and was told he had a new sister, and he wondered how she got in. In that room his father had died. He was very ill for a long time, and again Nurse Judkins came. He sat up with his father there night after night, and heard the church clock sound all the hours as the sick man lay waiting for his last. He rallie

uite fall

d reason, I will give it up; but, if you cannot, then, of course, we ought to g

the house, notwithstanding her youth. Two nights after this controversy she awoke suddenly and smelt something burning. She jumped out of bed, flung her dressing-gown over her, opened her door, and found

ne's bedroom, out into the gutter, and throug

as trembling

Mr. Furze; "it is in the

nt, crept behind the high parapet, and were soon in safety. By this time the smoke wa

here i

Underneath him was the kitchen, and beyond was the lower

her, "where are you going? Yo

he drop to the scullery roof was not above four feet. Catharine reached it easily, and, Tom coming after her, helped her to scramble down into the yard. The gate was unbarred, and in another minute they were safe with their neighbours. The town was now stirring, and a fire-engine came, a machine which attended fires officially, and squirted on them officially, but was never known to do anything more, save to make the road sloppy. The thick, brick party walls of the houses adj