212520_The_Adve ... _Way_Through_The_World.pdf - OUDL Home

154 THE ADVENTURES OF PHILIP
Sister; laughs over droll books ; laughs to herself, in her little
quiet corner at work ; laughs over pictures ; and, at the right
place, laughs and sympathises too. Ridley says, he knows few
better critics of pictures than Mrs. Brandon. She has a sweet
temper, a merry sense of humour, that makes the cheeks dimple
and the eyes shine; and a kind heart, that has been sorely tried
and wounded, but is still soft and gentle. Fortunate are they
whose hearts, so tried by suffering, yet recover their health. Some
have illnesses from which there is no recovery, and drag through
life afterwards, maimed and invalided.
But this Little Sister, having been subjected in youth to
a dreadful trial and sorrow, was saved out of them by a kind
Providence, and is now so thoroughly restored as to own that
she is happy, and to thank God that she can be grateful and
useful. When poor Montfitchet died, she nursed him through
his illness as tenderly as his good wife herself. In the days of
her own chief grief and misfortune, her father, who was under the
domination of his wife, a cruel and blundering woman, thrust out
poor little Caroline from his door, when she returned to it the
broken-hearted victim of a scoundrel's seduction ; and when the
old Captain was himself in want and houseless, she had found
him, sheltered and fed him. And it was from that day her wounds
had begun to heal, and, from gratitude for this immense piece of
good fortune vouchsafed to her, that her happiness and cheerfulness
returned. Returned ? There was an old servant of the family,
who could not stay in the house because she was so abominably
disrespectful to the Captain, and this woman said she had never
known Miss Caroline so cheerful, nor so happy, nor so good-looking,
as she was now.
So Captain Gann came to live with his daughter, and patronised
her with much dignity. He had a very few yearly pounds, which
served to pay his club expenses, and a portion of his clothes. His
club, I need not say, was at the " Admiral Byng," Tottenham Court
Road, and here the Captain met frequently a pleasant little society,
and bragged unceasingly about his former prosperity.
I have heard that the country-house in Kent, of which he
boasted, was a shabby little lodging-house at Margate, of which the
furniture was sold in execution ; but if it had been a palace the
Captain would not have been out of place there, one or two people
still rather fondly thought. His daughter, amongst others, had
tried to fancy all sorts of good of her father, and especially that he
was a man of remarkably good manners. But she had seen one or
two gentlemen since she knew the poor old father—gentlemen with
rough coats and good hearts, like Dr. Goodenough; gentlemen