Churchman, and perhaps more. He has not unfrequently evinced what may be good-humouredly termed, a sneaking sympathy with the Ritualists. At the same time, the hon. gentleman has invariably, both inside and outside of Parliament, displayed so much sound common sense with regard to questions materially affecting the welfare of the National Church, that we cannot for a moment suppose he would ever in his heart desire to see triumphantly supreme a school, the chief aim of whose existence appears to be the perfect development of ecclesiastical foppery. The important fact in connection with Mr. Hope's parliamentary handling of the several subjects we have referred to, is this: that on each and all of them, he speaks with no merely academic prosiness or preciseness, but lucidly, simply, and pleasantly; and altogether in such a way as to command the interested attention of the House. Moreover, he interweaves with his addresses a certain quaint drollery of illustration, which usually produces a happy effect; but which, at the same time, from its highly original character, fully justified Mr. Disraeli in once alluding to the "grotesque oratory of the hon. gentleman." Mr. Disraeli also, upon one memorable occasion, called attention to Mr. Hope's "Batavian grace," which was a quid pro quo for that gentleman's introduction of "the Asian mystery." That "Batavian grace" is a marked feature in Mr. Hope's personality, and the back view which the spectator in the gallery obtains of the hon. member's rotund and somewhat peculiarly-proportioned figure, is not easily forgotten; any more than is the original tone of voice which presently reaches his ear, as it issues forth in a stream of declamation equally striking and original. Mr. Beresford Hope has now sat in the House of Commons for a considerable period, and experience teaches the pleasing fact that his personality is as popular as it is respected and honoured.

MOTLEY.

"A FEMININE FEUD."

By the Author of "The Widowers' Wooing," "Maud Carrington's
Mistake," &c., &c.

"How late you are, Ben!-dinner will be ready directly. I've been to call on those Hevanses', and such a time I've had of it, you can't think. You won't catch me going there again in a hurry, I promise you. I'm not going to stand her hairs, not I."

"I am sorry to hear it, my dear. I thought Mrs. Evans would have been an acquisition to the neighbourhood. How did you get on? What did you say to one another?" And Mr. Jackson, a well-to-do candle manufacturer, settled himself in a comfortable arm-chair near the open window of the handsomely-furnished draw. ing-room of his handsome villa in the thriving parish of Riverside, and prepared himself to listen to his wife's account of the apparently hostile encounter-otherwise morning call-which had just taken place.

Mr. Jackson's brow was overcast and his manner depressed; he scented war, and his soul loved peace. He liked living in charity with his neighbours, and Mr. Evans, the recent purchaser of an adjoining handsome villa, was more than a neighbour-he was an old and long-standing City acquaintance and also a manufacturer, only he traded in leather and skins, and had not climbed the ladder step by step as had his brother manufacturer, but had suddenly been transplanted from the lowest rung to the topmost one by a stroke of his uncle's pen. In other words, from being a subordi. nate in that very industrious gentleman's house of business, he had become its head. Change of fortune had necessarily necessitated a change of residence and change of establishment. Mr. and Mrs. Evans had therefore migrated from a genteel eightroomed house, situated in a genteel terrace at Brixton, with its attendant maid-of-all-work and occasional charwoman, to the beforementioned handsome and commodious villa residence in the village of Riverside, a spot sacred to prosperous manufacturers, and within an easy distance of town: a villa with its tower and turrets and picturesque views, its Gothic porch and its Gothic windows, its three handsome reception rooms, its seven commodious bedrooms, and its bath-room; its two conservatories attached, and its capital kitchen garden; its grounds of about one acre, well timbered and shrubbed; its lawn sloping to the river; its flower-garden, with its vases and statuary, and its standard roses and flights of stone steps; its terrace and its red gravelled walks; its double coach-house,

ard its six-stalled stable; its two loose boxes, its harness room, its man's room, and extensive lofts; its pigeon room, cow-house and fowl.house, and every domestic convenience, all unusally complete and in beautiful order. As was the household :-three serving maids and one serving man, with two boys thrown in to equalise the balance of work-a boy in buttons to assist the maid-servants, and a boy out of buttons-and out of a good many other thingsto assist the man-servant. In the six-stalled stable were three carriage horses, viz., a pair of nags with black points fifteen hands high, and a good looking chestnut mare.]

In one of the "loose boxes" was a handsome brown cob, war. ranted "quiet to ride," for the joint use of Mr. and Mrs. Evans, neither of whom were remarkable for their feats of horsemanship. In the double coach-house was a miniature C spring brougham, and a mail phaeton, convertible at pleasure into a Stanhope or a waggonette; in the harness room were three sets of harness, the two mounted in silver, and the other in brass; and in the kennel close by was a jet black curly-coated retriever, who having no legitimate occupation of his own, amused himself and annoyed his neighbours by whining all day and baying the moon at night-at least, when there was a moon; when not, he resumed his pathetic howling.

Mrs. Jackson, familiarly known as Tilly, was a bright little person, with manners as vivacious as her colour was vivid; indeed the brilliancy of her complexion was a continual source of regret to her, for her colour kept pace with her animation, and she was always animated. Mr. Jackson admired both animation and complexion, while she sighed for the delicate hue of the lily. In the days of their courtship he had been wont to exhibit a charming photograph of his betrothed, coloured though toned down by an artistic photographer, and when one of his lady friends, who was suspected of having had designs on the hand of the well-to-do manufacturer, carelessly remarked that the face was pretty, but the colour was evidently very high, he proudly replied, "Ah, you should see the original; she has much more colour than that!"

Tilly was a thorough cockney; she liked her Sunday drives and her Sunday out. Though living in what might be termed the country every day of the week, she was fond of a crowd and fond of a gossip. She loved to array herself in light tints, as she did her chairs and her sofas, her walls and her floors. She always chose her husband's neckties, gloves, waistcoats and pantaloons, and endeavoured to make him look as gay as she could. The neckties were of the brightest blue or of the most startling magenta; the gloves were of light mauve or of light primrose; the pantaloons were the brightest combination the tailor could effect in

those sober-coloured habiliments; but in the under garments she was able to give her taste wider scope. His flannel shirts were the marvel of the laundress, and his gay-coloured socks and his many-coloured caleçons cost her many a pang, and many a scolding from the quick-tempered though good-natured Mrs. Jackson, who declared she was almost ready to cry when she beheld her brilliant scarlets come home a sickly-looking pink, her carefully selected arrangements of orange and mauve spots presenting an appearance of having not recovered from a bad attack of the measles, while her delicate light blues had become invisible to the naked eye.

Little Mrs. Jackson was brimming over with hospitality and friendliness, socially speaking, in her own circle, not out of it. She was a capital housekeeper, though but moderately accomplished, we are afraid to say educated, for her education perhaps came within the category of what the author of "Middlemarch" says is but another name for motley ignorance. She sang a little and played a little; but her performances on the pianoforte were such as to cause a Frenchman to exclaim, " Madame, ayez pitié, de ce morceau." Her French was chiefly remarkable for the uncompromisingly British accent with which the few sentences she was mistress of were enunciated, and it was during the dinner hour at the villa that they were generally brought into play. "Plu tar," the lady would say, checking her husband's communication, or 66 par devons les domestic," or, "arretez è presong."

This good-natured little person had but one antipathy, we believe, and that was towards the unoffending letter "h," which she treated with studied neglect and indifference, taking it up and utterly ignoring it in the most capricious manner.

"Well," began Tilly, turning herself round on the music-stool so as to face her husband, and keeping herself in perpetual motion on the revolving seat, "you must know I went up-stairs directly after lunch. I didn't stay a minute with baby, but began to dress at once. I put on this green 'pull de soir;' I thought it looked better than the mauve one, because of the lace, and because it went better with my new French bonnet-the white one, you know, with the pink feathers; and my beaded black jacket; and a new pair of gloves, Ben-primrose, four buttons. Well, I got there about four. I should have got there sooner, only cook kept me a long time-it's such bad weather for keeping things, and the larder is the worst larder in the whole parish, as I have told you twenty times."

"Yes, I know," interrupted her listener; " and so Mrs. Evans was at home?"

"Why, of course, or I shouldn't have seen her. There she was, sitting in a low chair in the drawing-room. I've heard such

a deal about that drawing-room from Susan, and-oh, my !—it's nothing like what I thought. Would you believe it, there wasn't a bit of wool work in the whole room; and if there's anything I do admire, it is chairs, and cushions, and fender stools, and screens like ours. She had nothing but a bit of chintz, and that was all odds and ends of patterns. And there was no middle table full of pretty things, as we have; only some bits of tables, of no use, standing about. I don't think the glasses had any frames to speak of: they looked nothing at all. I took all in at a glance, and I noticed--"

"Never mind the furniture, Tilly; what sort of looking woman is Mrs. Evans?"

"I was coming to her. There she was, sitting doing nothing, with a nasty little curly dog in her lap, who kept barking at me all the time, and who she kept talking to, instead of to me."

"I heard Evans say his wife was very handsome: what do you say, Tilly?"

"Of course Mr. Hevans thinks so, it's right he should; but other people needn't, if they don't like. Why, she's tall andscraggy, I call it; I dare say she calls herself slender. She has got great, big eyes, just like saucers; and her 'air done up anyhow: it's no colour at all, just like"-Tilly cast about in her mind for a fitting comparison, for a moment, and then came out with—“ blotting-paper colour. She has such a big, wide mouth, and kept smiling only because she wanted to show her teeth, because they were white; and she turns up her nose all the time, as if it wasn't turned up enough already. 'Andsome, indeed," concluded she, "and with that bit of a nose ! When you talk about beauty, I like a nose to be straight. And she has no complexion, Ben, but is dreadfully sallow-looking. And she wore one of those new

fangled gowns-all straight, no tunic or flounces. She did look such a guy in that tight thing. It was a dirty-looking drab colour -a very rich silk, but nothing to look at."

“Well, upon my word, my dear," said the husband, meekly, you have drawn a pretty picture! I don't know wh would think of it."

Tilly continued, without heeding her Ben's interruption: "I was going to shake 'ands with her, of course; but she bowed like this," and Tilly bowed haughtily from her music stool. "I was rather taken aback at first. 'I 'ope you like Riverside,' I said; 'it's a very 'ealthy place; you will get quite stout: it suits me and my 'usband wonderfully.' Then she minced just like this"-and Mrs. Jackson pursed up her lips, turned up her nose, and half closed her eyes, saying, "Be seated, pray.' So I sat down, and we looked at each other, and I looked round the room, and she