The Professional Aunt

as on the doorstep to meet me. Diana, by the way, had been christened "Diana Elizabeth," in case she should have turned out short and dumpy and, by some miraculous chance, dark. I looked for Sara in the tail of Diana's gown, -- I am afraid this is a literary license, as Diana does not wear tails to her gowns in the country as a rule, -- but Sara was not there.

"She is not there, said Diana. "The children are in the wildest state of excitement, and will you faithfully promise to go up and see them directly you have had tea?"

I would willingly have gone then and there, and murmured something about my box, and Diana said she hoped I had not brought them anything.

"Oh! nothing," I said; "only the smallest things possible"; knowing all the time that the woolly rabbit was, of its kind, unrivaled. But these are professional expenses, and what I spend does not afterwards give me a moment's worry. I have seen David, on the other hand, speechlessly miserable after buying a mezzotint, for the time b