THE SILVER LAKE STORIES. 23

ter Alice, ‘she is not like the step-
mothers you have told us about, she
seems so kind and lovely.’

“¢Yes, yes, said Jane, ‘and so was
my step-mother very kind and lovely
for the first week~or two, but she soon
showed out what she was!’ and Jane
shook her head, as if she could tell a
dreadful tale of cruelty, if she only had
a mind to.

“JT can scarcely think even now
without tears of the cold and cruel
treatment this gentle being received
from us, whom she would so gladly
have taken to her heart, or of the inso-.
lent manner of Jane to her during my