the heavy oak table, and lay insensible upon the floor. Cook ran at the noise, and her screams brought in the entire household. No one noticed Geoffry, as he stood as white, and feeling as cold as marble.

When cook raised her master's head from the floor, where he had fallen face downwards, she screamed afresh; for his features were a mass of blood.

'Oh! he's dead!' said she, wringing her hands and crying.

'He's dead, sure enough!' said the stableman. 'This is a bad job. Charlie, run for the doctor,' continued he to the boy.

'He's past all doctors, poor dear gentleman,' said cook. 'Doctors can't bring the dead to life, be they never so clever.'

Geoffry heard every word; it seemed as if the sayings of the servants struck him on the head like blows. He turned, and throwing up his arms in despair, with a short cry, he ran from the kitchen and the house,-he knew not and he cared not where. Then the servants for the first time noticed him, and said to each other, 'Why, it must have been Master Geoffry who did it. Was ever such a boy! and to end by killing his poor papa!' And they all shook their heads, and looked at their master, without doing anything to recover him, until the doctor arrived.

EOFFRY ran on and on for some time, never heeding which way he was going. He reached the sea-beach, which was two miles or more from the house; but he did not notice where he was. Still he ran along the shingles, not knowing why he ran; only remembering the words which the servants had used, and not doubting but that they were true.

At length he fell down upon the beach, being too tired to run any further, and he lay half stupid for a time. Everything seemed whirling through his head, as it does in a dream; but every now and then his father's face, as it looked when he was raised from the kitchen floor, came back to Geoffry's memory, and he would have got up and begun to run again, had he been able.

Several hours must have passed while Geoffry lay

upon his face on the beach. He had fallen in a very quiet part, where people did not pass often, so that he As evening came on, he fell into a heavy

was not seen.

sleep, and slept till daybreak.

But when he woke next morning, I cannot describe to you the misery he felt. He had slept so hard that he had not dreamed; but when the recollection came back to him, that his dear father was dead, and how he had been killed, he felt as if he were going wild. He sat up on the shingles and stared at the sea. The water was dancing about in little ripples and shimmering in the bright morning sun. It was very beautiful; but to Geoffry it looked horrid. He tried to think what he should do. He could not return home to see his father's dead body; he did not dare face his mamma and see her grief, and know that she looked upon him as the cause of it all. Where should he go? Then he remembered that talk he had had with George Clarke, about walking to Liverpool and entering on board a collier. Why should not he do so? He got up as he so thought. His limbs felt very stiff from his running of yesterday, and also from sleeping in the night air.

He walked back towards his father's house-he could see it through the trees from that distance-and then, all at once, the mist cleared away from his mind, and he thought of everything clearly, and he cried out,

'Oh, papa, papa! that I should have done it! I am the most wicked and miserable boy in the world. God must be very angry with me. I wish I was dead!'

But the next moment he said, 'No, no! I am afraid to die now.' Then he wondered if he should be hanged for shooting his father, and wondered if the policemen were looking for him; and he started off as if he had never run before, leaving his straw hat behind him on the shingles.

When Mrs. Lisle returned home she found the doctor there already. She knew something had taken place directly she came into the house; for the servants who had been looking out for her ran back into the kitchen.

'What is it, Sam?' she called to the page-boy.

Sam burst out blubbering for answer.

Lisle felt frightened, and said,

Then Mrs.

'Has anything happened to Master Geoffry? Where is your master?'

The nurse, who was the only sensible one in the house, came down just then, and said,—

'Don't frighten yourself, please maʼam. Master Geoffry is quite well-it's master.

'What of your master?' asked Mrs. Lisle; but she did not wait for an answer to her question, but ran upstairs and into the bedroom where Mr. Lisle lay, with Dr. Murray bending over him.

'Do not be frightened, Mrs. Lisle,' said the doctor;

'he will do very well, but is weak from loss of blood. Come here, you can help me.'

So she had no time to cry or to think, but had to help to bandage up her husband's head, and to sponge the blood from his face; for Dr. Murray had to pick out every one of the shots, and of course it made it bleed very much.

It was only when Mr. Lisle was quite as comfortable as he could be that Mrs. Lisle said to the doctor,'How did it happen?'

'You must ask the servants,' he said; 'I have had no time to learn.'

Mrs. Lisle listened to all that the cook had to tell her, but cook did not know for certain that Geoffry had fired the gun. Cook believed herself that the gun had gone off of its own accord, as she protested guns were in the habit of doing; but she did not seem to remember that guns were not in the habit of walking out of corners of their own accord. I think cook was afraid that she should get Geoffry into difficulties, so she preferred knowing very little about it. But as soon as she had finished all she had to say, her mistress asked,— 'Where is Master Geoffry?'

Geoffry had not been seen, of course, since the accident had happened, and Mrs. Lisle directed that he should be looked for, as she knew his father would be sure to ask for him.

She then went back to Mr. Lisle; but an hour or