Hugh: Memoirs of a Brother

room, adjacent to the nursery, where the tiny creature lay, lost in contented dreams, in a big, white-draped, white-ho

nder spire; the other window looking over the garden and a waste of heather beyond, to the fir-crowned hill of Ambarrow. My father had been Headmaster for twelve years and was nearing the end of his time there; and I

oudly, I thought-announced the fact of Hugh's birth to the boys whom he had asked in, as his custom was, to breakfa

significance for me at that time, but I was deeply interested, thought it rather cruel, and was shocked at Hugh's indecorous outcry. He was called Robert, an old family name, and Hugh, in honour of St. Hugh of Lincoln, where my father was a Prebendary, and because he was born on the day before St. Hugh's Feast. And then I really remember nothing more

Hills &

ODGE, WELLINGT

porch is the study. In the

of him at all, because I was at school with my elder brother, and only came back for the holidays; and we two had moreover a little sanctum of our own, a small sitting-room named Bec by my father, who had a taste for pleasant traditions, after Anthony Bec, the warlike Bishop of Durham, who had once been Chancellor of Lincoln. Here we arranged our collections and attended to our own concerns, hardly having anything to do with the nur

ble. My mother was sitting with Mr. Penny in the drawing-room after luncheon, when Hugh, in a little black velvet suit, his flaxen hair brushed till it gleamed with radiance, his face the picture of innocence

being present at so sacred an interview, but as she reached the door, she heard Mr. Penny say: "And what shall

wick, Arthur Sidgwick, and my mother were all under Beth's care. Then she came on with my mother to Wellington College and nursed us all with the simplest and sweetest goodness and devotion. For Hugh, as the last of her "children," she had the tenderest love, and lavished her care, and indeed her money, on him. When we were all dispersed for a time after my father's death, Beth went to her Yorkshire relations, and pined away in separation from her dear ones. Hugh returned al

R. Slings

GH BENSON

HANCERY,

76. A

you are thinking about, Beth!" "What is it, dear?" "Why, about Hugh, of course! You don't care for anyone else when he is coming." "No, don't say that, dear-but I am pleased to think that Master Hugh is coming home for a bit-I hope he won't be very tired!" And she used to smooth down her apron with her toil-worn hands and beam to herself at the prospect. He always went and sat with her for a little in the evenings, in her room full of all the old nursery treas

s a slow and difficult business; but she used slowly to compile a little letter from time to time to H

gton

1887]

ou will like something for tea, you can keep your cake for your Birthday. I shall think about you on Friday. Everybody ha

e

y and ungrudgingly; wherever Beth is, she will find service to render and children to