fancy ran on until they were all firmly persuaded that there was an imprisoned nun in the roof, to whom packets of cake and biscuits and consolatory messages must be sent up by means of a long-handled broom. A juvenile tea-party was convened one half-holiday for the express purpose of making an effort to set free this unfortunate, and very amusing is the account given us of the solemn enterprise, and the fright of the little visitors who went home in hysterics, and set afloat all sorts of gossip about the strange doings in the clergyman's household. The nun retired, discredited; and a new notion about a Writer--who could see into every house, and wrote down all he saw— succeeded. He was supposed to be always looking through one particular corner of the ceiling, and yet to be always going about and bringing back scenes to Annie, his partner.

'Annie never built castles in the air about herself,' we are told. 'She seemed to stand apart, like some Lady of Shalott, watching the passing and repassing of shadows: it was, she used to say, as if she were watching the progress of an interminable tale, in which her own being took no place.' A delicacy of the chest kept her indoors a good deal every Spring; and as the progress of time took the brothers to school and left the two younger sisters very much alone together, they

'Lived with visions for their company,

.And found them gentle mates.'

Visions inspired by books now. 'Unknown to parents and teachers, Annie made raids on the downstairs library, where she filled her pockets (the large, loose pockets of those days, tied on under the dress) with volumes of Rollin and Plutarch, which she devoured afterwards in corners of our own domain; and which were full of people more real and far more interesting than any of Mrs. Sherwood's creations. But how meagre the histories were, after all!.. How many things must have happened to Themistocles, for example, that nobody ever thought of writing down! Themistocles was Annie's pet-hero.'

'How well,' continues the sister, writing of this period, 'I can recall the winter twilight in our low square room: the books heaped into corners, the red fire-glow, the weird shadows upon the walls cast by oil-lamps in the street outside, the walk round and round the room amongst the changing lights and shades, holding pleasant discourse, or P. D., as we called it. Socrates was there, and Themistocles-they met for the first time in our room-and Socrates talked intimately in our hearing with his noble and beautiful friends. Alcibiades was there also, and Plato and Pericles. We never tired of this story conversation, and Annie was rarely behind-hand with the supply.'

Of course religious meetings had their place in the child-world, and elections also, Hull being notable for both. But by-and-by Mr. Keary's health compelled a removal to the country for one entire summer, and a new life opened to Annie. An old-fashioned house, with real dark nooks, a garden, a river, and shrewd country people, full of racy peculiarities: it was all delightful; and besides other interests, botany and natural history unfolded their wonders to the young student.

After this came school terms, furnishing many studies of girl character to the books afterwards written, and some friendships that enriched the whole of life. Beloved by all the girls, Miss Keary was not so popular with the teachers. Those were the days of Pinnock and Magnall's questions, when it was the prayer of every respectable schoolmistress that she might be saved from turning out blue-stockings. 'Lizzie,' said the head-teacher one day, 'of what were you and Annie Keary talking so eagerly in the garden during the English-speaking hour?' With some confusion Lizzie made answer that Annie was telling her all about gravitation and the fixed stars.' 'H-m,' was the freezing reply, 'I think it's a pity Miss Keary cannot find something more edifying to say to her companions.'

The desire to express her thoughts in writing began to take shape some three years after she left school. Mr. Keary had been forced to give up all work and to remove to Clifton, and there Annie found another friend who came nearer to her than any other person ever did, and who, appreciating her artistic power, helped to give her confidence in it. He understood exactly the contradiction between her weakness and her strength, and saw just how and where the hardness of life would hurt her.' For many years this tender, sympathizing love sustained Annie's hesitating, timorous steps; but when it faded from her-in what way we are not told-she did not drift into a region of storms far from all quiet moorings. One after another departed on whom she had leant: her childhood's companion, Arthur; her ideal and guide, Henry; her lover; and her father; and for awhile she felt her feet falter and the light grow dim; but her nature was too sweet, too humble and child-like, for any bitterness. She was never out of sympathy with others because her own life had been robbed of its chief joys; sorrow did not age her, nor disappointment harden. She remained with her mother and sisters in the London home, making no claims for herself or her literary purposes, ready always to help in the housekeeping, to write letters to friends, to weave charming fables for a circle of children. The interests of others, their cares and sorrows, were hers; and the years that looked

so poor and dry in prospect, grew rich with various interests and many friends. 'She was not apt to make plans for the benefit of people; she did not try to set others right; she only listened to and loved and understood her fellow-creatures.'

In 1858 Miss Keary was taken by a friend for a winter's travel in Egypt, a flight into the world which cost her some pangs of fear-as all changes did; but was productive of much deep pleasure, and suggested a book on Early Egyptian History. During the next ten years she was occupied with several other books, and with the care of her invalid mother, beside family and social affairs. Then her mother died, and other sorrows and trials followed, darkening the sky and making her long for a more vivid sense of God. Some years before this she had come upon what seemed ‘a bridge of light across darkness, a cloud was rolled away from her vision of God, and she was able to look up with confidence....And she had never gone back; through every stage of life her spiritual nature had been ripening; but there came times when the light was not warm enough for a bereaved heart, nor strong enough to sound all the depths of spiritual need. As years went on, also, and she read and thought more, she found more and more to trouble her in the theories of science and in speculation. She had not herself any serious doubts;... her spiritual intuitions never failed her ;...but her feet faltered where before they had firmly trod.'

And more than once in these troubled, dark periods her heart led her into paths which her intellect afterwards forbade as travelling down, not up. One of these was Spiritualism, in regard to which it may be said, as of other experiences, that she found herself warned away by her intellect from the desires of her heart.' Another was what is called Anglo-Catholic teaching.' This seemed to offer much that she desired: a high sense of the supernatural, a tender compassion for the poor and afflicted. 'What she desired more earnestly than any assertion of doctrine, was to have a clear vision of Christ, to feel His power and His joy in her heart;' and she believed that the Ritualist community in the East of London, with which she identified herself for a while, was composed of the most fervent, loving and joyful people she knew; and that going to them was like going to a fire to be warmed. At the same time her instinctive fairness made her say: 'I don't mean that they have more of this joy and strength than is to be found among Low Church or Broad Church or Quakers or any others; I have seen it in all.'

In truth she was moved, here as elsewhere, by her sympathies with dear friends; and in time her soul passed through the stage of weakness and mist in which it had leaned too much on outward supports. A sharp attack of illness which followed the writing of

Castle Daly cleared her spiritual sight. Thoughts communicated in childhood awoke from long slumber, with new, sacred meanings, and faith rose up stronger than before. She returned the Associate's cross, and set her face away from Ritualism, to find erelong a brighter light and a surer resting-place. Some two years later she wrote to a nephew: 'I feel as if I had got down to the bottom and felt the ground-work under our feet, the substance out of which all our existence is woven, and know as I never did before that there is infinite love all round us, and that joy and peace and victory are to be the issue of all our struggles... .....I tell you this because it may be cheering to know that as one gets older one does really get happier instead of sadder, that there is light opening out brighter and brighter towards the end.'

Twice after her mother's death Annie and her younger sister went to the South of France for several months, to the lovely country afterwards described in her story, A Doubting Heart. During the first of these she began Castle Daly, the publication of which lifted her to a high rank among literary artists; although she herself never could understand why it did so. A new undertaking followed. The sisters spent some months in a Servant's Home established by a friend, and Annie would lie awake at night pondering over the affairs of the girls, and planning their lives. Her sympathy was ever ready; her hope, even for the most hopeless, Christ-like in its power.' Then came the second visit to Pégomas, during which some of these girls and others in whom Annie was interested were followed with affectionate letters. Then she went back to England and began her new book, with greater confidence in her vocation than she had ever felt before, and more enjoyment in the work. Long letters to various friends show how she had at last reached a Land of Beulah, 'where sweet breaths from the heavenly hills blow tranquillity and peace about the heart.'

In this peaceful and fruitful time, on the 2nd of March, 1878, she went out to consult a physician on some symptoms which excited a slight-but a slight-anxiety, and came home again with the knowledge that only a painful operation could give her any chance of continued years in this world. She underwent the operation with simple child-like trust, endured with unwavering patience and graciousness of manner' the long year of suffering and increasing weakness that followed, and passed away early on the morning of her fifty-fourth birthday. 'If I should be found worthy of any name in the life to come,' she said to a dear friend, her attendant, I should like it to be Sister-Aunt.' Her last words were 'a baby hymn' she used to repeat to the children at the hospital.

OF BOOKS.